Tanks, Thanks

I am an Altaholic, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. I feel being one isn’t a bad thing, but makes me a better player. How you might ask? Simple, by playing different classes and toons, I learn more about them, their playstyle, and their roll.
Some of the guys I work with play on Hydraxas, so I decided to roll a new toon there. They already have a healer, and several DPS, but not a full time tank. So I rolled a Druid. Why a Druid? Simple, the versatility. By speccing feral, I start out with both a DPS and a tank spec. Now I use kitty when I’m questing or soloing, and bear when I want to run an instance.
The best part of being a tank, is no queue. The worst part… people. I want to apologize to all the tanks I’ve ran with. Bel, Elk, Euron, Zana and the rest, I’m sorry for every stupid thing I did as a DPSer. I apologize for not misdirecting when I should’ve. I’ve given you gray hairs and ulcers. I know know your pain.
In the few instances I’ve ran as a tank so far, I’ve dealt with healers that said they were ready when they weren’t. I’ve dealt with DPSers that are in such a rush, they AoE before I’ve even hit a single mob. Ones that don’t burn my target, but go after ones that have just been with a single demoralizing roar, forcing me to ping pong around getting them all to reconcentrate on me.
I have a good bit of health, but my gear is… lacking. I can be critted. I know that most people are used to tanks in heirloom gear, but I don’t have any on this server. So please be patient with me. I need time to build aggro. I don’t have swipe or thrash yet. So please kill my target first. So until next time don’t forget to respect your tanks, so they will keep queuing up for you.

The New Look For Hunters

BREAKING NEWS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
OK, the preview came out today, some good, some meh, and some very good so lets take a look and see what we can see.

With the upcoming World of Warcraft: Cataclysm many game elements will be changing, and each class will be receiving a number of tweaks. Here, we will explore the changes that are being made to the gun-wielding, pet-training hunter. The information you’re about to read is certainly not complete, and is only meant to act as a preview of some of the exciting new things to come. Without further ado, let’s take a look at the new hunter abilities!

New Hunter Abilities

Cobra Shot (level 81): A new shot that deals Nature damage instead of Physical damage. This ability will share a cooldown with Steady Shot. This will give hunters an alternative to Steady Shot on heavily-armored targets, and we will have talent incentives in the Beast Mastery tree to make this a signature shot.

Hrmmm…a new shot….and BM gets talents to better it and make it our version of explosive and chimera shots.

Trap Launcher (level 83): When used, the next trap can be shot to a location within 40 yards. This provides the current Freezing Arrow treatment to all traps and, as a result, we will be removing the current ability Freezing Arrow. 1-minute cooldown. No global cooldown.

Well this will make getting traps into place during combat easier. Heh I just had a vision flash through my head of flying snakes, and Samuel L. Jackson…

Camouflage (level 85): The hunter enters an obscured state that prevents him or her from taking ranged damage. The character would still be subject to melee or area-of-effect attacks, and dealing or taking damage will break the Camouflage effect. The hunter can move and set traps when under Camouflage, and will receive a damage bonus when attacking while under Camouflage (which will then break the effect).

Ummm… vanish 2.0? So we can still be smacked around in melee, and it drops the minute we stub our toe…

Resource Mechanic Change

Here we come to the meat of the upcoming hunter changes.

Hunters will no longer use mana; instead the class will use Focus. Focus generates much like Energy, by building up. It will not be affected by Intellect at all. Haste will improve its generation. Hunters will generate roughly 6 Focus per second, slightly less than rogues’ Energy generation rate of around 10 Energy per second. Below, we have listed some examples of how we intend Focus costs to operate:
Steady Shot/Cobra Shot: No cost. Generates 9 Focus per shot (or 12 per second instead of 6).
Arcane Shot/Chimera Shot /Explosive Shot: 45 Focus.
Aimed Shot/Multi-Shot: 60 Focus.
Concussive Shot/Tranquilizing Shot: 35 Focus.
Rapid Fire/Master’s Call/Disengage: 30 Focus.

Hrmmm…. Luckily these values aren’t set in stone yet. Oh, and since when is 6 slightly less than 10? 9 is slightly less, 8 is still slightly less. Hell even 7 would barely be considered slightly less. 6 is almost half the amount of focus that rogues regen.

Changes to Abilities and Mechanics

In addition to the resource change and new abilities listed above, we intend to make adjustments to some of the other abilities and mechanics you already know well. This list and the summary of talent changes below it are by no means comprehensive, but they should give you a good sense of what we’re going for with each spec.

A major change coming for the hunter is the removal of ammunition. Guns, bows, and crossbows will now do damage without consuming ammunition at all. There will be no more ammo slot on the hunter’s character display. Any ammunition that a hunter has at the time of the change will become gray sellable items. Existing quivers will be converted into large bags — though each hunter can only have one and non-hunters will not benefit from this change — and we will not be making any additional quivers.

Sweet no more ammo! now to buy the biggest quiver I can get my hands on for a cheap quiver…

Pet management will also change. Hunters will now have two types of attainable pets: active pets and stored pets. Hunters will be able to have up to three active pets (perhaps five for Beast Mastery specialized players) and will have the ability to switch among these pets any time they are out of combat, without going to town. They will also be able to have a large number of pets in storage at the stables. In order to swap a pet from active to passive, a hunter will still need to visit their local Stable Master. However, this should afford ample storage for the many Spirit Beasts wandering the lands of Azeroth.

Pets…Pets…Pets…More pets… LOTS AND LOTS OF PETS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This means I’ll be able to go hunt down the rest of the spirit beasts, get a worm, a chimera, a cat, a raptor, birds out the wazzu….I can use a different pet every day of the week…. MWAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

Additionally, hunters will now start with a race-appropriate pet at level 1 and will be able to tame a different pet at level 10. We are also changing many pet family abilities to provide important buffs and debuffs. The intention is to allow the hunter to be able to swap pets and fill a position if a certain role is missing from the group. The goal is to have all pets provide a damage increase that is very similar and no greater than any other pet. Some examples of the changes we are making to the pet families are listed below:
Wind Serpents: Will provide a debuff that increases the amount of spell damage taken by an enemy (similar to a weaker version of the warlock ability Curse of Elements).
Ravagers: Will provide a debuff that will increase an enemy’s Physical damage vulnerability (similar to a weaker version of the warrior ability Rampage).
Hyenas: Will provide bleed damage (similar to a weaker version of the druid ability Mangle).

Hmmm race specific pets at level 1 interesting, not that it took that long to get to level 10 to get your pet before that… While I like the fact that Blizz wants our pets to be able to fill in the blank until we get a better version in the group/raid, I wonder how much weaker it will be than the class version.

Stings and other periodic effects will now benefit from haste and critical strike ratings. Hasted damage-over-time abilities do not lose duration, but instead add additional damage ticks.
Viper Sting will now restore 9 Focus every 3 seconds.

So all of our stings will get the 2piece T9 bonus nice… Viper sting only worked on targets with a mana bar, so will the new version work on all targets, or just those with focus bars or mana bars?

We are reinforcing hunters as a ranged class. To this end, the class will now start with ranged abilities at level 1, and we will be removing some melee abilities, such as Mongoose Bite.

Great now new hunters will be forced to learn how to shoot first and melee later.

New Talents and Talent Changes

Beast Mastery hunters will have a new talent called Careful Aim, which increases the damage of the next Steady Shot or Cobra Shot, but also increases the cast time of these abilities. The intention is to make the combination of spells into a decent damage opener, especially in conjunction with the new ability Camouflage.

So we’ll get talents that will increase our haste bringing our cobra and steady shots closer to the GCD, and get talents that increase their casting times… Ow my head…. kinda backasswards I think.

Beast Mastery hunters will also have talents that make Cobra Shot superior to Steady Shot, such as Longevity reducing the cast time of Cobra Shot to 1.5 seconds.
Rapid Recuperation will cause Rapid Fire to give 20/40/60 Focus immediately and will cause Rapid Killing to generate 3 Focus per second.
Efficiency will reduce the Focus cost of Chimera Shot, Aimed Shot, and Arcane Shot.
Thrill of the Hunt grants Focus when you land a critical strike.
Hunter vs… Wild increases the hunter’s Focus generation when his or her pet is snared, stunned, or rooted.

Mastery Passive Talent Tree Bonuses

Beast Mastery

Ranged Damage
Haste
Pet Damage

Pet Damage: Many of the passive benefits to pet damage will no longer be available in the Beast Mastery talent tree. However, these will be provided through the new Mastery mechanic.

Ummm I though GC said that they didn’t want our pets to do more than 30-40% of our damage. So if our BM mastery is going to boost our pets damage even higher, isn’t that counter-intuitive to their own philosophy?

Marksmanship

Ranged Damage
Armor Penetration
Double Shot

Double Shot: The hunter will have a chance to launch a free attack off of the global cooldown for 50% damage.

Survival

Ranged Damage
Ranged Critical Damage
Elemental Damage

Elemental Damage: Hunter abilities such as traps, Black Arrow, and Explosive Shot will do elemental damage of the following types: Arcane, Fire, Frost, Nature, and Shadow.

We hope you enjoyed this preview, and ask that you provide your initial thoughts and feedback on what was presented here. Please keep in mind that what you’ve just reviewed is a work in progress and as we move closer to the Cataclysm beta, you’ll see these planned changes as well as others continue to develop in response to feedback and testing.

So it looks like BM is FINALLY getting some big time lovin from Blizz. I can’t wait to see how it turns out. Now if they play their cards right, it would seem that they are finally bring all 3 specs in line for damage. So until next time don’t forget to reload, so you don’t run out of ammo.

What Does GC Think Of BM DPS…

 

Couple of things this week. First off wiping on Rotface at 5% when you have 24 people repeatedly is truly frustrating. Alas real life sometimes likes to smack you in the face like it was your pimp. However I did end up getting a nice little upgrade last week Wodin’s Lucky Necklace.

So according to MMO-Champion, 3.3.3 should hit the live servers this week. That’s good news for us BM hunters. FI will become an aura, our steady shots will do 9% more damage, and Fluffys of the world will get the ICC buff also. GC also chimed in on BM hunters in the forums to share his views and opinions on where we stand in terms of BM’s DPS in comparison to other hunter hunter specs.

From MMO-Champion

Hunter (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Beast Mastery in 3.3.3
So what are you saying about those players who estimate BM will be very close to Survival with the changes? Are they wrong? If so, talk to them instead. We don’t really expect the community to come to a consensus on anything, but on the other hand, when some players are saying "they’re close" and some players are saying "they’re not" then more than likely, someone is wrong.
Again, if you really like BM, you should be able to raid as BM with this change. Your raid leader may ask you to respec for the hardest Icecrown fights, but if you’re on those fights, then you’re probably used to being asked to make specific changes in order to maximize even the most marginal efficiency gains. At that point "close enough" might not be enough. At that point swapping for a 1% dps gain might be worth it. We’re not going to get every class within 1% of each other in every situation, and players on that content know that.
On the other hand, if you’ve been wiping on normal Festergut for the last four weeks then I can almost promise you that swapping from BM to MM is not what’s going to suddenly buy you success. (Source)

Ferocious Inspiration in 3.3.3
In 3.3.2, Ferocious Inspiration rank 3 says: When your pet scores a critical hit, all party and raid members have all damage increased by 3% for 10 sec. In addition, increases the damage dealt by Arcane Shot by 9%.
In 3.3.3, Ferocious Inspiration rank 3 says: All party and raid members have all damage increased by 3% within 100 yards of your pet. In addition, increases the damage dealt by Arcane Shot and Steady Shot by 9%. (Source)

Theorycrafting hunter specs in 3.3.3
Using something like Shandara’s dps spreadsheets in 3.3.3, yields something like 15,000 for Marks, and 13,500 for Survival and BM. BM may be slightly below, but it’s not by much, and given that this is a spreadsheet and not a raid parse, I think it’s safe to assume that’s within the human margin for error.
There was a recent interview with two of Paragon’s hunters in which they offered that they thought BM and SV were close and MM was maybe 1500 ahead in best gear. That’s pretty consistent with the numbers I pulled out of the air above.
If you think sources like that are in error, feel free to bring that up. But you kinda need to do so before saying "every spreadsheet model" etc. point to a massive disparity. (Assuming what you’re arguing about here was my saying BM and SV are close.)
Ideally all three numbers are 15,000 and that’s a good if probably unrealistic goal to shoot for. In the mean time, BM should be close enough to Survival that you can raid with it, given that there are plenty of Survival hunters raiding today. If you don’t get anywhere near 15,000 dps today (and current hunters are closer to 11 to 12K as highest dps in Icecrown), then the delta is likely to be even smaller, perhaps below 1K. (Source)

So GC thinks that if you want to raid as BM, you should be able to, that’s good. He also acknowledges that we are not as high a DPS spec as MM, as if that was something new. He does make a good point about switching specs though, if you don’t have the skill to play your class then the most OP spec in the world will not help you at all.

The other big thing that he said was that we should be close to survival in DPS, and that both specs will be behind MM. That’s a new view from the powers on high. GC had promised a pony, we didn’t get it yet, but he gave us a mule. Close, but not quite the same. Now all they need to do, is give us better pet scaling, and we can give MM a run for the money. So until next time don’t forget to reload, so you don’t run out of ammo. 

View From The 3.3.3 PTR Part 2

Ok, I finally got around to finishing up testing the changes to FI on the PTR this weekend. So without further ado lets take a look at the results shall we?

Overall damage and DPS on the live server

Now for the PTR

OK, so over all my total DPS went up by 109.8. Not too bad of a boost to our DPS. With raid buffs that should make quite a difference. Now next lets take a look at how the damage broke down per shot.

Live Server

PTR

So on the live server, I fired off 10 more shots than on the PTR, 585 on live and 575 on PTR.  However, even with that difference, the changes to SS increased its percent of over all damage by 1.5%.

Each shot on the live server averaged 1702.3 damage, and with a shot speed of 1.29 seconds gave an average DPS of 1319.3 per shot.

Each shot on the PTR averaged 1912.9 damage, with a shot speed of 1.29 seconds  gave an average DPS per shot of 1482.8.

This is an increase of 163.5 DPS averaged per shot. Not to shabby in my opinion. Now the changes aren’t game breaking. They won’t push us over the top back to the best raid spec again. As much as I would love for that to happen, we’re still a long way off from that. However, this is a step in the right direction. With the right buffs, and pet management this will give us that increase that we need. Now all we have to do is keep Fluffy up and nomming away on the mobs and we can show those nonbelievers that we can do the DPS and we are a competitive spec.  So until next time don’t forget to reload, so you don’t run out of ammo.

3.3.3 Shows A Little More BM Hunter Love

News Flash, Blizz has had a change of heart about how they feel about BM hunters. I tried to get some extra time this weekend to hop on the PTR, but it didn’t happen. However, the patch notes have changed, again, and it looks like BM hunters are getting a little more love…

Hunters

• Talents
  • Beast Mastery
    • Ferocious Inspiration: This ability is now an aura and provides 1/2/3% damage to all party or raid members within 100 yards and boosts the damage of Steady Shot by 3/6/9%.

 

OK. Let that sink in…
…
…

There, that’s better now isn’t it. It looks like they’re changing FI again, now with NEW AND IMPROVED GOODNESS!!! So let’s have a look  at FI and how it has changed.

3.3.2 and before
FI would proc a 3% damage boost when Sushi crits. It also boosted Arcane Shot’s damage by 9%. However, it could be overwritten by Arcane Empowerment.

3.3.3 PTR Round 1 The Warm Up
FI is now an aura that gives a flat 3% damage bonus to everyone in range. Instead of boosting Arcane Shot it was going to boost Steady Shot by 9%. The hunters of the world sighed in unison as we were going back to a 1 button mashing machine.

3.3.3 PTR Round 2 Fight
FI gets changed a 3rd and hopefully last time, as the saying goes “the 3rd time is the charm.” The damage bonus is still a 3%damage bonus aura in this version. However, the 9% bonus to shot damage now applies to both Arcane and Steady Shot… That is going to be a very nice boost to our over all DPS. This isn’t going to be the be all end all for BM hunters, but it is a step in the right direction.

Now as far as testing on the PTR so far, well umm I haven’t had a chance to do more than log in and setup the spec for me and Wife. I can confirm though that both buffs are being displayed. So in the next few days, I’m hoping to finish up several different tests. I’m going to be doing a baseline test on the live servers first. From there I’m going to head off to the PTR to test the new FI by itself. Finally I’m going to be running a series of tests with and without AE in the group using auto shot only. So until next time don’t forget to reload, so you don’t run out of ammo.

3.3.3 Foolishness

So the PTR is up for 3.3.3, a long with the new patch notes.

Hunters

• Talents
  • Beast Mastery
    • Ferocious Inspiration: This ability is now an aura and provides 1/2/3% damage to all party or raid members within 100 yards and boosts the damage of Steady Shot by 3/6/9%.

So it looks like ferocious inspiration is getting an overhaul. The damage buff is being changed into an all the time aura. Cool, now let’s see hwo well that holds up on the PTR. I’ve copied Gwen over and had Wife copy a mage so I can see if arcane empowerment stacks or over writes it. The other half of the change is that FI will no longer boost arcane shot by 1/2/3%. Instead it will boost STEADY SHOT by 3/6/9%…. DAMN IT!!! BM hunters have been trying to loose the one button mashing, face rolling, window licking, drooling idiot rep since TBC.I know that Blizz has said they wanted to up our PVE DPS, and make us more of an active spec. But, this this is nuts. If this does take effect, it’s time to start stacking ArP by the boatful. So I’m off to the PTR to test this tonight and see how bad it is. So until next time, don’t forget to reload, so you don’t run out of ammo.

DPS Survey or How I Hunter

I know it’s been a while since I posted but I’ve been super busy lately. Recently someone started out a DPS survey, and I found a copy on both Aspect of the Hare and Stabilized Effort Scope. So with out much further ado…

 

What is the name, class, and spec of your primary DPS?

Hi, my name is Gweninu, I’m a hunter, and my main spec is a  Beast Master hunter and my secondary spec is Marksman.

What is your primary DPSing environment? (i.e. raids, PvP, 5 mans)

I mainly DPS in raids due to time constraints.

What is your favorite DPS spell/ability for your class and why?

That’s a tough one. See I swap back and forth between BM and MM as I need to. When I’m running BM, I love Beastial Wrath. It’s the trade mark ability of BM, and is a huge damage boost. Since they added the passive 10% damage bonus, it has helped boost my DPS even higher. When I’m running as MM, it’s definitely Chimera shot. The versatility of the shot and the extra damage are a real boost.

What DPS spell do you use least for your class and why?

Mulishot for both BM and MM, hands down. It shares a cool down with aimed, you can’t fire it on the move, and the damage is low.

What do you feel is the biggest strength of your DPS class and why?

My biggest  strength is the sustainable mobile DPS that I can bring. On the run or standing in one spot, I bring a steady and constant stream of DPS. Then there’s my pet. While I’m busy running around playing don’t stand in the red stuff, he’s busy nomming away on what ever we are fighting at the time.  The fire and forget aspect does give me some leeway when DPSing certain bosses. Hodir and the twin Valks come to mind right away.

What do you feel is the biggest weakness of your DPS class and why?

Our biggest weakness is gear dependency. We are so dependent on getting specific gear that is itemized properly, it makes my head spin at times.

In a 25 man raiding environment, what do you feel, in general, is the best DPS assignment for you?

Single target burn down. What can I say, I’m pretty single minded, and with my DPS and the pet’s DPS we can really turn it up on DPS. Not to mention, if it’s a fight like hodir, where I have to move a lot, I can sick the pet on the target and let it chow down while I am running like a maniac.

What DPS class do you enjoy DPSing with most and why?

Feral druids hands down. I love leader of the pack. Nice big fat juicy crit bonus, and they don’t have anything that will overwrite FI. 🙂

What DPS class do you enjoy DPSing with least and why?

Classes that overwrite my FI lol. I mean ugh it’s the only buff that I can bring to the raid people. Seriously though, there really isn’t a any class that I don’t like to group with, but I do prefer to group with those that can toss me a buff. 🙂

What is your worst habit as a DPS?

Tunnel vision. Plain and simple. There are times that I will get so focused on just maximizing my burst DPS, that well…ummm. why am I surrounded by green flames? I didn’t use a path of Illidan before Jax… OMG IT BURNS!!! GETITOFFGETITOFF!!!! Yeah paying too much attention to my DPS and not watching where I’m running off to, that would be my worse habit.

What is your biggest pet peeve in a group environment while DPSing?

People who act like they just bought their account on eBay… You know the ones… dpsers who can’t, or worse, won’t control their aggro… Tanks who refuse to switch to a tanking spec…Healers who heal so fast they draw aggro, or don’t pay attention to who they are healing. Oh and lets not forget the biggest of them all…. the premadona’s out there that think just because they are a meatsheild or a healbot that they can treat everyone else in the group like crap.

Do you feel that your class/spec is well balanced with other DPS?

Wow is that loaded question. For the most part, yes hunters on the whole are fairly well balanced. Now is BM as balanced as MM or Survival? No, but there was a time when BM was the macro spam king and we were at the top. So I guess it’s fair that they get their time to shine.

What tools do you use to evaluate your own performance as a DPS?

Mainly recount.

What do you think is the biggest misconception people have about your class?

That we are easy mode. It’s true we’re not the hardest class to play, and leveling is fast. Then there was the old days of vanilla WoW where we could afk auto shoot our way to the top of the damage meters, but those days are long gone. No matter what spec you are now a days, you really have to pay attention to shot rotation and pet management if you want to be noticed as a hunter who can get the job done and not be just another huntard.

What do you feel is the most difficult thing for new DPSers of your class to learn?

Micromanagement, a good rotation and threat management. At one point in time I would have said knowing how to chain trap, but CC has practically been removed from the game it has become a lost art.

What DPS class do you feel you understand least?

Melee without a doubt. I’ve been learning them though, my DK is almost to 80, so I’ve gotten a better idea of what they have to go through in a fight.

What add-ons or macros do you use, if any, to aid you in DPS?

For macros I only use one, and that combines steady shot and kill command when it’s up. As far as add-ons I use omen, DBM, arc hud 2, and recount.

[Your class’s preferred basic stat] over other stats or balanced stat allocation, and why?

I do have a tendency to stack agility, however I try to get a balance of stats. I aim to keep my hit capped, and from there a mix of int, crit, haste armpen, and AP. While straight agility is great for the attack, crit and dodge I know that some pieces are better than other for keeping my DPS as high as possible.

So there you have it. A little bit about me along with how and why I hunter. So until next time don’t forget to reload so you don’t run out of ammo.

Big Changes In Our Future

Ghostcrawler: Hey beast master hunters…
Beast master hunters: Yes GC?
Ghostcrawler: Got a riddle for you mwahaha
Beast master hunters: <shudders> OK…
Ghostcrawler: When is a nerf not a nerf?
Beast master Hunters:…
Beast master Hunters:… bwah?
Beast master Hunters:…
Ghostcrawler: When we make changes Beastial Wrath and The Beast Within LOL
Beast master hunters: <Flies into a fit of nerd rage> AAARRRGGGHHHH, WHERES MY PONY! YOU PROMISED ME A PONY!!

Hunters

     Talents

Beast Mastery
The Beast Within: The duration of this talent has been reduced to 10 seconds. In addition, hunters with this talent will do 10% additional damage at all times.

Bestial Wrath: The duration of this talent has been reduced to 10 seconds.

Yes, Bestial Wrath and the boost from The Beast Within will now last for only 10 seconds, down from 18 seconds. That’s the nerf in GC’s joke. The Beast Within will now INCREASE the hunter’s damage by 10% at all times. That’s definitely not a nerf. Now when I first read this,I also most flew into a fit of nerd rage. The signature talents for beast master hunters, our biggest boost in DPS and mana conservation cut almost in half?? WOW you really DO hate beast master hunters…

Then I went back and reread it a second time and a third time. I started to think about it, and let it sink in. Yes the 50%pet damage is gonna get smacked down hard. Yes our 10% damage boost and 20% mana reduction is going to be cut back. But, we will be receiving a 10% damage boost ALL the time… When we pop Bestial Wrath, we will still be getting the 10% boost and 20% reduction. It’s not looking to bad now is it. Our overall DPS will be boosted, therefore bringing us more in line with marksman’s and survival’s DPS. Well this along with the changes to armor penetration, needs to be checked out farther. So, it’s off to the PTR to do some testing to see how the changes are looking to BM and MM. I will let you guys know the results.

So until next time don’t forget to reload, so you don’t run out of ammo.

Cataclysmic Changes Are Coming… Eventually…

BlizzCon has come and gone again, but this year at least I was able to watch some of it live. Seems until they decide to have a BlizzCon out on the east coast, the best I can do is get the live stream and watch bits and pieces. So the biggest news was of course Cataclysm. Lots and lots of changes are supposed to be coming down the pipeline when it lands.

New Races

They were right at mmo-champion, we will be getting 2 new races the worgen for the Alliance, and the goblins for the Horde. I was excited when the rumors of the Alliance getting the worgen came out, and sort of meh about the goblins. Wow.com has the official race class combo line up here. It looks like I was almost right on all accounts. I was wrong about both priests and druids, the puppies they will get both of them. As for shammies… well I was undecided and looks like Blizz said no to puppy shaman. I am excited about worgen hunters and cant wait to see all new hunters with their wolf pets named jr, or sonny or something along that line lol. Now as far as the goblins go, at first I didn’t care about them one way or the other. Now though I’m intrigued by them. The lore and class combos definitely worth taking a look at. However, it’s their racials that really got me to be excited about them.

Hunter Changes

Wow… That’s all I can say. We have some major changes in store for us when Cataclysm breaks. Everything we knew is going to change. Mana, armor pen, haste, agility, attack power, and talent trees nothing will be the same.

Mana is going away. that’s right no longer will we have to worry about running out on mana, or being killed by mana burn. Now we are going to be getting Focus. That’s right, we lose the blue bar and get the yellow bar. Blizz stated that focus will regenerate at a set 6 per second. Haste is, in theory, going to increase the regen rate for us. They have stated that steady shot is going to increase our focus regen from 6 to 12 per second.

Armor pen is going away. So every marksman armor pen build is going away. Instead every class is getting a new stat called mastery. Mastery is going to be tied into your talent build to give you different passive bonuses based on your build.

Attack power will no longer be a stat on gear. You heard me right. Instead we will be going old school =). Us old farts who were here back when MC was the “hottest” thing around remember stacking agility. Back then, we would stack agility and drop other gear no matter what other stats were on it. Why might you ask? Simple. We would get 2 RAP for every 1 agility. Blizz decided to bring back the old way, and I couldn’t be happier about it.

The talent trees are staying 51 points deep. I’m fine with that. I’ve lost track of the times I wished I had just 5 more talent points to finish up a particular build. They also said that they are going to be reworking all the existing talents. Now all they have to do is make beast mastery a more viable raiding tree and fix exotic pets… We are also going to be getting new passive bonuses based on what talents and how far we go into certain trees.

There are even more changes coming, but I’ll get into those at another time. So it seems that good things are coming our way hunters, even though  the world is about to end. So until next time, don’t forget to reload so you don’t run out of ammo.

3.2… Well… So Far…

Patch week!!!! Yippee Skippy!!! Now due to time constraints, deliveries, appointments, and the cosmos conspiring against me, haven’t given me any real time to sit down and test anything seriously.  So without further ado I give you my impressions of 3.2 so far…

Pet Scaling

First off lets look at pet scaling. Yes it has been fixed! Yep for those of you who remember back when 3.2 went up on the PTR, I decided to run some tests on it so see how the scaling was looking. Well, lets just say that not only wasn’t I impressed with the results, I was ticked off. At the time on the live realms my pet wasn’t missing but was getting plenty of dodges and parries, that was expected. The most expertise that your pet could have pre 3.2 was 10 points. My pets weren’t missing any melee attacks, we were both at hit cap. Sushi’s spirit strike was still missing sometimes, since my hit rating didn’t put him at his spell hit cap.
Now on the 3.2 PTR that was supposed to have all changed. IF I was at hit cap, then my pet would be at hit cap, spell hit cap, and expertise cap also. They weren’t.  Oh lord were they ever pooched. Pets were missing far more than they should’ve been, it was as if they weren’t getting any of our hit rating or anything that was supposed to scale with it. The expertise that our pets were getting wasn’t there either, the number of dodges and parries were sky high. It seemed they weren’t getting the expertise from the animal handler talent either. I was afraid very afraid…
Well 3.2 has gone live, and from what I can tell that all of the pet scaling issues I have mentioned so far have been fixed. I have been keeping an eye on recount to see how the scaling is working. All I can say is, I have not seen a sign of the problems I saw on the PTR. I haven’t seen a miss dodge nor parry. Now the resilience change is a different story. I haven’t had a chance to get into any BGs or do any arenas with Wife yet soo…

The Stealth Change

Now every patch has a few undocumented changes. Some big, some not so big. Well hunters had two that I’ve found so. When I was finally able to get logged in on Thursday night, I noticed that half of my action bar was missing… YAY stealth free talent respecs!. You have to love when they do that.Now mind you this happened after the patch went live, so it was on Wednesday or Thursday, so it might have been a late add in after the rolling restarts.
The other stealthy change was a pleasant little boost to our DPS. No, I’m not talking about the  change to cat like reflexes. Its the change to animal handler. Since our pets expertise now scale with out hit rating, the expertise bonus would be kinda useless. So, now with 2 points in Animal handler our pets do 10% more damage with all attacks. That’s a nice chunk of bonus damage, and an excellent way to start bringing our DPS output up to par with marksman and survival. Now all they need to do is make Ferocious Inspiration stack with the buffs that increase attack power….

All in all 3.2 is turning out to be pretty good so far, I want to try running the new instances and There is 1 thing that I need…One thing That I must have….

courtesy of mmo-champion

Thanks again Daniel, You were an inspiration in the game and in the blogosphere. And don’t forget to reload all so you don’t run out of ammo.