If serpent sting can't proc Lock n' Load, (and the split internal cooldown for freezing traps / serpent sting is fixed), then it might not be a great idea to have Black Arrow ticking while you're on Ln'L cooldown.

... i might be wrong though, because i have no clue what the "Traplauncher" is. I remember reading something about "exciting new trap mechanics" - have i missed some important info or are you just assuming there will be an "arrow" version for every trap

EDIT : actually i'm wrong about Black Arrow. 30 sec cooldown, 15sec uptime. Fire it on Ln'L proc, wait for the cooldown, fire it again.

As I mentioned in 3.1 upcoming changes thread.

I think that the best talent tree for SV will be:

http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?hunt...&version=9614#

assuming that ES refresh immolation trap, and will be possible to have dots from SS and BA at the same time. (and gain BA +6% dmg , SS via noxious sting +3% dmg)

Glyphs: Immo, Aimed, Hawk

The patchnotes on mmo-champion we're edited, but earlier tonight it said:

However, that part is gone now.

And why wouldn't you just fire Black Arrow on cooldown no matter what? LnL can proc off black arrow or immo trap, and since you'll have immo trap up 100% of the time you won't be able to use other traps for dancing.

Ah, I didn't think of that, taking points out of iAotH to put in noxious stings would probably be a stronger build.

to be honest, I am still uncertain why with 3.1 3% off noxious stings have suddenly become left out of many suggested builds. After all, 3% is 3%, and Serpent Sting will do more damage for a GCD than Steady (especially when 3% is taken into account).

Personally i'm still keeping it in, however i imagine a lot of test builds will avoid it, since we wont be using the glyph of steady shot (probably) the need to put serps is less viable when you can be putting up 6% on the CD and then not have to waste an ES at potentially 6% increased damaged on applying a serps.

I still think having both will be a dps increase, 2/15/54 really seems to be the way forward at the moment, but the rotation is obviously yet to be finalized. (On top of that i can't imagine these changes being permanant throughout the testing phase)

Honestly, I'm a little baffled by the SV changes. As things currently stand, I'm generally paying more attention to cooldowns and debuffs/dots than I really want to. There are times when staring at my buttons prevents me from paying enough attention to my environment (zomg, don't stand in the void zone). Now it seems like they want to add several more timings to pay attention to. If things turn out the way they look like they will, I'll be praying that MM does comparable damage to SV so that I can go back to that, as I found it to be a much more comfortable pace (noting that i preferred SV back in TBC).

Given the assumption that I'm an average player, I can only assume there's a fair number of people that will feel the same way I do (if SV turns out as complex as it looks like it will be). You would think they would have learned their lesson with locks complaining about the number of things they have to watch.

Could we try to write patch-things in the correct topic?
Let's save this for the current build.

3.1 Upcoming Changes

I second that, I hope the changes are staying, I've loved going to Survival for dps after the former patches, because it makes raiding a bit more interesting when youre not just staying there and popping cd's/spamming steady while keeping serpent up.

Also, http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?hunt...&version=9614# would be my preferance in a specc as well.

With a prio of BA > Immo trap (glyphed) with launcher > ES > Aimed > Serpent Sting > Steady Shot.

It won't be any different than things are now. You'll keep an eye on cooldowns and hit the highest priority shot when it's available, with a little bit of logic to hold off on one shot if a higher priority one will be ready shortly. There will just be more shots to keep track of.

I don't mind more interesting decisions to make during combat. I just don't want more things to keep track of without them adding any real thought to the process.

It looks like we will have to rethink the optimal glyphs.
Explosive Shot seems like a must to regain the lost crit from the nerfed T.N.T. talent. Serpent Sting is probably the best to drop for that.
Aimed and Kill Shot glyps also seem tempting, but can they offset Steady Shot's or Hawk's glyph bonuses?

I run arround with 39% crit unbuffed at the moment and since Ulduar wil provide better gear, the ammount of crit wil only increase. I'm pretty sure Explosive Shot Glyph won't be a must in PvE because im alrdy getting roughly 50%+ crit raidbuffed to the teeth in 25 man raids. Perhaps usefull for hunters who yust starting to raid but once you start getting some good gear. It becomes less and less usefull the more crit you get.

Edit: nvm about glyph of immolation, noticed traplauncher and immolation refresh aren't on PTR.

One thing to note is that with the proposed changes we will only proc LnL off Black arrow and Immo traps periodic dmg and frost and freezing trap activation. The change that prevents bosses from triggering freezing trap means trap LnL procs will only come from adds.

Also in terms of managing cool down we now have to watch ES (6s), Black Arrow(30s), Aimed (8s), SrS(21s) assuming you glyph for aimed which I intend to. There is no rotation for SV possible anymore as 1 LnL will destroy the synergy with Black Arrow (BA). We will be pushing out even less steadies as a result so no one should glyph for steady and should instead glyph ES, Aimed, and KS.

I won't get into the PvP rap they did to us here but instead will have stuff posted in the PVP section soon. All in all I am slightly disappointed because the last thing we needed was to have our DPS become more complicated while we are already falling behind casters almost across the board.

I too am liking the 2/15/54 but I am wondering if dropping a few points of master tact down to 2/5 would be better spent elsewhere. As it stands now fully buffed I am close to 50% crit so MT seems like a talent of diminishing returns. Either spent in hawk or stings. With these new shots and more uses of the gcd I am also thinking the steady shot glyph may be the disposible glyph in that we will be firing steady even less now. I am thinking 2/18/51

Glyphs, hawk, serpent, and aimed. The immolation glyph is now interesting with essplosive shot refreshing it but the 3 second window seems a bit close to call on movement fights. For patch dps races it may prove better. The reason I like serpent is a couple fold, it buffs all damage by 3% so it needs to be on the mob, longer duration means less gcd's spent on a lackluster attack, and movement fights it is always ticking when you are running around. The lower cd on aimed means more aimed and less steady which is why I'm going away from the steady glyph. With 5 points in hawk it may make the hawk glyph unnecessary making way for the immo glyph.

One item that I think folks have forgotten about is the Biznicks scope from back in MC. Using the pawn strings from the speadsheet 30 hit outweighs 40 crit. I have found that switching my glove and boot enchants to agi along with the scope change will give me about 8 dps on the spreadsheet. This will probably be even better with the change to hunting party.

We will all have to talk our tanks into allowing us to set immo traps before fights I think.

*Edit bad link on 2/18/51

What's really perplexing me is how so many people are considering the aimed shot glyph viable.

I understand it has been changed to reduce the cooldown by 2 seconds instead of some trivial mana cost reduction, but it simply doesn't provide an increase in damage over the steady shot glyph.

My claims are based using the following assumptions:

• The priority queue used is Explosive > Aimed > Serpent > Steady.
• For simplicity, I have ignored special, long cooldown buffs and kill shot (since kill shot has no bearing on our 'rotation').
• You will not wait even .5 seconds for an ability to come up. Instead, you will be firing the next highest priority shot immediately, and then use the higher priority shot on the next gcd. (This primarily affects aimed/serpent)

The two rotations come out as shown below, over 26 GCDs (this is when the aimed shot cast lines up again, and thus, could be considered a full cycle)


What I am finding is that lowering the cooldown on aimed shot by 2 seconds effectively allows one steady shot to be replaced with one aimed shot every 39 seconds (every 26 gcds), resulting in 5 Aimed shots instead of the non-glyphed 4.

In order for glyph of aimed shot to surpass glyph of steady shot, you would need for aimed shot to deal more damage than a steady shot plus the bonus glyph damage of 13 other steadies i.e. Aimed shot must deal 2.3 times more damage than steady shot in order for the aimed shot and steady shots glyphs to be equal in power.

Side note: Because of the interaction of a 1.5 second GCD with odd cooldown numbers (non-multiples of 1.5, such as the 8 with a glyphed aimed shot) glyph of multishot ends up being equally effective if you choose to use multi over aimed because 1/2 of the lower duration is wasted in a tight cycle (i.e. casting steady instead of waiting an extra .5-1 second for aimed to be ready.).

I think dropping 2 points from master tact making 3/5 and putting them in Imp stings and only having 1/5 still for Imp aoth (assuming 10% hasted unbuffed) using Aimed Shot, Serpent Sting, Hawk Glyph would be a pretty good idea, although I dont know for sure. Would have to see some PTR/SPread Sheet numbers.

THis would leave a 10% chance to increase crit rating by 6% rather then 4% along with more damage from Serpent Sting and with the glyph allowing for less mana and GCDs to be used on serpent sting allowing for more ES and AS esp with AS glyph. +2%crit > +3% Attack Speed for for 12 seconds seems worthwhile to leave that 3rd point in Master Tac vs. the 2nd point in iaoth, especially with the crit loss on ES from TNT. Guess we will see in time. WHat do you guys think?

The spec would still be a 1/18/52http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?hunt...4&version=9614


EDIT: But I can also see Serpent Sting being useless for Surv Hunters. But that would free up points from wyrven sting/Noxious Stings allowing them to be placed elsewhere. MAN so much theory crafting to do ><

This is precisely my concern. With the GCD resource needing to be distributed amongst a lot of abilities with non-compatible cooldowns (either with each other, or with the GCD), it seems that SV is becoming needlessly complex, both in terms of theorycrafting and actual play.

Unless they go back to the immolation trap refresh and trap launcher thing that was on MMO Champion initially, I'm not sure I see trap mastery being very compelling. The lock and load proc chance on immolation trap isn't that high and with the changes to sniper training, I don't see trap dancing for a chance of an immolation proc to be really worthwhile. Am I missing something?

Looks to me on fights with adds that can be affected we can still try to use slow traps for that 100% proc chance, but on more straightforward fights LnL is going to be a cross your fingers and hope sort of talent unless they buff up black arrow, reduce the cooldown, or improve the proc rate. I'm actually wondering if LnL is even worth the point investment if the proc rate ends up being super low- 2 points is kind of a no brainer since there's really nothing else PvE useful to put them in, but a 3rd point in its current state looks questionable to me.

Interesting reading. However, most people take aimed shot, not for the damage boost since multi will do the same. They take it for the utility of having an instant that they can use on the move.

I noticed that you didn't factor in Black Arrow into that rotation. Would that offer any change?

Why would SerpSting be useless?

Steady Shot (Rank 4)
A steady shot that causes unmodified weapon damage, plus ammo, plus [RAP * 0.1 + 252]. Causes an additional 175 against Dazed targets.

Serpent Sting (Rank 11)
Stings the target, causing [RAP * 0.2 + 1210] Nature damage over 15 sec. Only one Sting per Hunter can be active on any one target.

At 6000AP raid buffed Serpent Sting is out damaging Steady even with Crits factored in. Not to mention it's another instant cast.

As for the Glyph of Explosive Shot increasing the critical strike chance of our #1 damage dealer seems like a clear winner. I don't understand why people are downrating this Glyph regardless of your Crit rate. Diminishing returns on crit related buffs are moreso related to uptime, i.e. Hunting Party, Gfft, Expose Weakness, Frenzy. I don't see diminishing returns on this Glyph, 4% is 4%. If you take 10,000 Explosive Shot Ticks, that means you would have 40 more that crit regardless of your current crit rating. On a average boss with 100 Explosive ticks, 4 extra that critted would be what, 15k extra damage done?

Actually most people don't take Aimed, it seems like it is currently more half and half with 2/18/51 and 6/14/51 from what I can tell. Although I agree with you, I like Aimed personally, but I don't see the Glyph to reduce the CD by 2 seconds being a better choice over other Glyphs. Often times Aimed Shot gets pushed back a CD anyways because it comes up at the same time as Explosive.

Ok, with bosses that have adds using a Frost trap would be the way to go. But with bosses being immune to it and 3.1 making that immunity not trigger the frost effect, the bosses that don't have adds will have to rely on Immolation and Black Arrow. Now my point is what do you think will give you a bigger DPS boost, 3/3 in Hawk Eye or 3/3 in Trap Mastery? Without the need to stand 30 yards out for Sniper Training, Hawk Eye is almost useless but Trap Mastery will at least yield an increase in damage on the times that a Immolation Trap is used.

I expect that with the changes to survival, we'll see more people speccing more than 51 points into the tree, which is going to make focused fire unreachable, in which case aimed becomes a lot more attractive since the extra points in imp hawk are less compelling without it, although I suppose maybe people will want more points in imp hawk than they have now if they don't have room for it with the new glyphs.

I haven't done the math on the new LnL, but I'm just not seeing manually running in and dropping an immolation trap to be a very good idea with the changes. You'll basically be giving up the benefit of sniper training for 6 seconds plus whatever time it takes to do the movement to drop the trap. Then you won't have any control over the LnL proc. I think immolation trap ticks every 3 seconds which would mean you have what a 50% chance of an LnL proc sometime in the next 15 seconds if you dropped one? If the 30 second cooldown on LnL is still there and you already have black arrow up, you already have a chance to proc it from that (I don't know what the black arrow tick rate is). So basically you're talking about investing 3 talent points to gain a small damage boost to immolation trap which you won't be using in the first place unless somehow the trap dancing and chance mechanics involved outweigh the negatives. Anyone who sucks less than me at napkin math want to work out some rough idea on the damage tradeoffs?

Just a note on hawk eye btw, I wouldn't go way out of my way to get it, but there are definitely occasions where it has improved my damage slightly by allowing me to start attacking again faster in situations where I got out of range. Sapphiron is a good example- sometimes you have to hide behind the ice blocks pretty far in the back- the sooner you can get back into shooting range the more damage you'll do. It's situational, but it's not completely without its damage benefits.

Well since Black Arrow is going to be on a shared CD with traps GC Said. Its safe to take those 3 points out of trap mastery and put them back into Hawk Eye?http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?hunt...4&version=9614 or is it more viable to keep the 3 in trap mastery so can get more DPS from IMO traps on trash. Hmm Discuss.