- Hunter's Mark: The ranged attack power bonus from this ability has been increased from 300 to 500.
- Master Marksman: This talent now also decreases the cost of Aimed Shot and Chimera Shot by 5/10/15/20/25%.
5/27/09
3.1.3 Hunter Notes
The first 3.1.3 patch notes are floating around out there, and the two hunter items are both nice for Marksman:
5/19/09
Marksman 1-80 (Part 6: Professions & Secondary Skills)
This time I'm going to go over what may be my real obsession, professions. I'll talk a bit about the secondary skills, as well.
Profession Notes
Hunters benefit reasonably well from leatherworking, engineering, jewelcrafting, alchemy, and enchanting. Inscription is useful to a lesser extent, but the offhands aren't really focused on a hunter, so you're probably better off buying your glyphs, unless you're doing inscription for the money. Blacksmithing produces some mail, and some useful weapons, but not enough to warrant taking it yourself. Tailoring makes bags, but the rest of what it produces isn't likely to be useful to you. If you specialize your leatherworking, dragonscale is the mail specialization. Whether you go goblin or gnomish engineering is mostly a matter of whether you want the sapper charges or the gnomish gadgets. Alchemy specialization depends more on what you want extras of.
Leatherworking is a good choice for making your own armor, and is fantastic for self-sufficiency while leveling. It will produce armor kits for you, and give you bracer fur linings, even after you upgrade beyond what you can craft. Several of the crafting bags are made by leatherworking, as well. If you specialize, Dragonscale makes mail.
Engineering is good if you want to make your own ammunition and/or weapons (guns) while leveling. It also produces an array of gadgets, trinkets, and explosives which can assist you while soloing. (The goblin landmine can render you a bit over-powered in the 30s and 40s.) Goblin and Gnomish are probably equally useful, and the difference is negligible at the upper levels. Engineering also makes scopes, which come in damage, crit, hit, and haste flavors. (You'll have to farm Molten Core for the hit scope schematic if you want it, though.) Seaforium charges aren't as important in Northrend, but going into Dire Maul (North) you'll probably want them to get to the last couple bosses, as well as in Shattered Halls to avoid the slime tunnel. (Seaforium will also open chests and lockboxes.)
Jewelcrafting will make you, at lower levels, mostly rings, necklaces, trinkets, and little statues that will heal you. The statues that heal you are pretty awesome - it's like a bandage you don't have to channel yourself. At the upper end, you'll get some of the best gems, and be able to make some awesome rings and necklaces. Gems are also perennial best-sellers on the auction house, for a ready source of cash.
Alchemy provides healing potions, mana potions, elixirs, flasks, a few miscellaneous concoctions, transmutes, and a handful of trinkets. The trinkets (at least a philosopher's stone, initially, and later upgrades of it) are required for transmutes - they also have decent stat boosts, and enhance your regenerative potions. Alchemists get potions specific to them which act like a rejuvination potion, plus give a random elixir buff. Some alchemy products sell well at auction. Specialists have a chance to create extra items.
Enchanting is useful because you can crunch all those greens you get while questing to either buff your own armor or sell for cash. Enchants can be put on scrolls and auctioned now, so it's a little easier to make cash without hanging out in town, but scrolls don't sell as readily as you might think. (It's a paradigm shift that hasn't quite happened.)
The gathering professions - skinning, mining, and herbalism - are easily paired with a crafting profession to provide materials, or can be used as a source of income. Mining and herbalism are both more lucrative than skinning right now, although arctic furs sell very nicely.
Secondary Skills
Cooking, Fishing, and First Aid are all useful to a hunter. Don't sell your cloth until you max that type of bandages. (I know, I know... wool is insanely overpriced in the auction house, but you can get money much more easily, later, with the oodles of mageweave you'll be getting.)
With the changes to out of combat mana regeneration, hunter mana regen is even worse than it's been in the past. So while you're probably going to be spending a bit of time in Viper, you're also probably going to be drinking quite a bit, especially if your health is down, too. In other words, you're going to be eating a lot. Cook your food for buffs; eventually you'll be able to make pet buff food, too.
You can talent your pet to not need food often, but sometimes it's still faster to just toss your pet a piece of food to make him happy. Fishing can both give you ready pet food for several popular pet families and give you access to nice buff food. You can fish anywhere at any level now - you may not catch anything useful, but you can skill up fishing wherever your fancy takes you now.
Next up: pets. (Yes, pets. You're still a hunter.)
Profession Notes
Hunters benefit reasonably well from leatherworking, engineering, jewelcrafting, alchemy, and enchanting. Inscription is useful to a lesser extent, but the offhands aren't really focused on a hunter, so you're probably better off buying your glyphs, unless you're doing inscription for the money. Blacksmithing produces some mail, and some useful weapons, but not enough to warrant taking it yourself. Tailoring makes bags, but the rest of what it produces isn't likely to be useful to you. If you specialize your leatherworking, dragonscale is the mail specialization. Whether you go goblin or gnomish engineering is mostly a matter of whether you want the sapper charges or the gnomish gadgets. Alchemy specialization depends more on what you want extras of.
Leatherworking is a good choice for making your own armor, and is fantastic for self-sufficiency while leveling. It will produce armor kits for you, and give you bracer fur linings, even after you upgrade beyond what you can craft. Several of the crafting bags are made by leatherworking, as well. If you specialize, Dragonscale makes mail.
Engineering is good if you want to make your own ammunition and/or weapons (guns) while leveling. It also produces an array of gadgets, trinkets, and explosives which can assist you while soloing. (The goblin landmine can render you a bit over-powered in the 30s and 40s.) Goblin and Gnomish are probably equally useful, and the difference is negligible at the upper levels. Engineering also makes scopes, which come in damage, crit, hit, and haste flavors. (You'll have to farm Molten Core for the hit scope schematic if you want it, though.) Seaforium charges aren't as important in Northrend, but going into Dire Maul (North) you'll probably want them to get to the last couple bosses, as well as in Shattered Halls to avoid the slime tunnel. (Seaforium will also open chests and lockboxes.)
Jewelcrafting will make you, at lower levels, mostly rings, necklaces, trinkets, and little statues that will heal you. The statues that heal you are pretty awesome - it's like a bandage you don't have to channel yourself. At the upper end, you'll get some of the best gems, and be able to make some awesome rings and necklaces. Gems are also perennial best-sellers on the auction house, for a ready source of cash.
Alchemy provides healing potions, mana potions, elixirs, flasks, a few miscellaneous concoctions, transmutes, and a handful of trinkets. The trinkets (at least a philosopher's stone, initially, and later upgrades of it) are required for transmutes - they also have decent stat boosts, and enhance your regenerative potions. Alchemists get potions specific to them which act like a rejuvination potion, plus give a random elixir buff. Some alchemy products sell well at auction. Specialists have a chance to create extra items.
Enchanting is useful because you can crunch all those greens you get while questing to either buff your own armor or sell for cash. Enchants can be put on scrolls and auctioned now, so it's a little easier to make cash without hanging out in town, but scrolls don't sell as readily as you might think. (It's a paradigm shift that hasn't quite happened.)
The gathering professions - skinning, mining, and herbalism - are easily paired with a crafting profession to provide materials, or can be used as a source of income. Mining and herbalism are both more lucrative than skinning right now, although arctic furs sell very nicely.
Secondary Skills
Cooking, Fishing, and First Aid are all useful to a hunter. Don't sell your cloth until you max that type of bandages. (I know, I know... wool is insanely overpriced in the auction house, but you can get money much more easily, later, with the oodles of mageweave you'll be getting.)
With the changes to out of combat mana regeneration, hunter mana regen is even worse than it's been in the past. So while you're probably going to be spending a bit of time in Viper, you're also probably going to be drinking quite a bit, especially if your health is down, too. In other words, you're going to be eating a lot. Cook your food for buffs; eventually you'll be able to make pet buff food, too.
You can talent your pet to not need food often, but sometimes it's still faster to just toss your pet a piece of food to make him happy. Fishing can both give you ready pet food for several popular pet families and give you access to nice buff food. You can fish anywhere at any level now - you may not catch anything useful, but you can skill up fishing wherever your fancy takes you now.
Next up: pets. (Yes, pets. You're still a hunter.)
5/15/09
Marksman 1-80 (Part 5: Glyphs)
So far we've gone over talents, stats, and gear. This time:
Glyphs
Hunters have a lot of major glyphs and... 6 minor glyphs.
Picking 3 minor glyphs is easy: Feign Death, Mend Pet, Revive Pet.
Revive Pet basically means less kiting, more pewpewing, and the glyph for it means you're getting it off in no more than four seconds (once you talent for it). Mend Pet means you're not feeding your pet as much, which will either save or make you money, depending how you get your pet food. Feign Death's shorter cooldown makes it easier for you to push aggro back onto your pet (or bail if things go really badly), which again cuts down on kiting time. I'd probably pick up Mend Pet first, and then either of the other ones next.
The other three really just aren't as useful. Scare Beast might be if you do a lot of PVP (where feigning really isn't as useful), and the Pack glyph may have situational uses (I've heard something about Yogg-Saron's brain), but really doesn't apply that much. The glyph of Possessed Strength is just... well... odd. The only thing Eyes of the Beast was ever useful for (besides prowled cat scouting) was pulling Baron Geddon and Shazzrah in Molten Core back into Garr's room where there was more room to maneuver. So, yeah... probably best to just skip those three for most purposes.
Major glyphs aren't as cut-and-dried; you have 27 options.
Glyph of Serpent Sting is important once you get Chimera Shot, because more Serpent Sting damage means bigger Chimera Shots. Glyph of the Hawk is also a solid DPS boost in group settings when you can mostly stand and shoot during your Hawk procs, to take advantage of the haste. It's probably not as useful for soloing, due to the amount of movement minimizing the boost (from extra auto shots) from the haste. Glyph of Steady Shot is also good during group play - more stand and shoot time, so more Steady Shots, and you'll rarely not have Serpent Sting up. Reduced cooldown glyphs are popular (Chimera, Aimed, Kill Shot), but are mostly a boost in fights where you can't stand and shoot; the Steady Shot glyph and the Hawk glyph will net a larger DPS gain in fights where standing still is viable. The overall net DPS for a raid may be about the same.
Those are mostly end-game glyphs, however. The Serpent Sting glyph is probably useful regardless of level; some of these may suit you better outside the raiding environment:
Next up: Professions (and secondary skills).
Glyphs
Hunters have a lot of major glyphs and... 6 minor glyphs.
Picking 3 minor glyphs is easy: Feign Death, Mend Pet, Revive Pet.
Revive Pet basically means less kiting, more pewpewing, and the glyph for it means you're getting it off in no more than four seconds (once you talent for it). Mend Pet means you're not feeding your pet as much, which will either save or make you money, depending how you get your pet food. Feign Death's shorter cooldown makes it easier for you to push aggro back onto your pet (or bail if things go really badly), which again cuts down on kiting time. I'd probably pick up Mend Pet first, and then either of the other ones next.
The other three really just aren't as useful. Scare Beast might be if you do a lot of PVP (where feigning really isn't as useful), and the Pack glyph may have situational uses (I've heard something about Yogg-Saron's brain), but really doesn't apply that much. The glyph of Possessed Strength is just... well... odd. The only thing Eyes of the Beast was ever useful for (besides prowled cat scouting) was pulling Baron Geddon and Shazzrah in Molten Core back into Garr's room where there was more room to maneuver. So, yeah... probably best to just skip those three for most purposes.
Major glyphs aren't as cut-and-dried; you have 27 options.
Glyph of Serpent Sting is important once you get Chimera Shot, because more Serpent Sting damage means bigger Chimera Shots. Glyph of the Hawk is also a solid DPS boost in group settings when you can mostly stand and shoot during your Hawk procs, to take advantage of the haste. It's probably not as useful for soloing, due to the amount of movement minimizing the boost (from extra auto shots) from the haste. Glyph of Steady Shot is also good during group play - more stand and shoot time, so more Steady Shots, and you'll rarely not have Serpent Sting up. Reduced cooldown glyphs are popular (Chimera, Aimed, Kill Shot), but are mostly a boost in fights where you can't stand and shoot; the Steady Shot glyph and the Hawk glyph will net a larger DPS gain in fights where standing still is viable. The overall net DPS for a raid may be about the same.
Those are mostly end-game glyphs, however. The Serpent Sting glyph is probably useful regardless of level; some of these may suit you better outside the raiding environment:
- Arcane Shot: The mana return may be good for soloing, especially at lower levels where higher level glyphs aren't available yet.
- Freezing Trap: Especially nice for PVP.
- Mending: Increased healing means your pet lives longer - with a tenacity pet, may be especially nice for soloing.
- Trueshot Aura: Better for solo play than group play - some of the other +10% AP buffs seem to overwrite the aura when they proc, minimizing this glyph's usefulness in groups with those classes; the DPS gain is about the same as that of the Glyph of Steady Shot, however, and given the more mobile aspect of soloing, the Trueshot Glyph is probably more useful.
Next up: Professions (and secondary skills).
5/14/09
Marksman 1-80 (Part 4: Gear Notes & Gems)
Having covered stat priorities for Marksman, next up is gear and gems.
Gear Notes
Marksman hunters, especially now that they get AP from Int via Careful Aim, should look for "of the Falcon" (Agi/Int) gear while leveling. Marksman has always been a mana-intensive playstyle, as well, so you'll want the mana, anyway. (The "of the Falcon" mail is stupidly expensive on the Bronzebeard Horde auction houses right now.) After that, Monkey (Agi/Sta) is the best option, then Tiger (Agi/Str), Wolf (Agi/Spi), or Eagle (Int/Sta). Straight up Agility or Attack Power doesn't hurt, either. Crit is good for a Marksman. You're not going to find much hit rating gear while leveling, so don't worry about that until you start getting closer to the top-end dungeons. I'd prioritize gear as Agi/AP, Crit, Int, Sta until you get to the point where hit rating and haste start to appear.
Ranged weapons are kind of spotty in old world leveling - they crop up a lot more (and in a lot more variety) once you get to Outland and Northrend. Questing, you'll find one every ten levels or so; if you run instances at level, you'll probably find upgrades more often. There are more bows than guns, but they're both fairly common; there are about half as many crossbows as either bows or guns, though. If you're not particular about which you use, you can carry some of either kind of ammunition and just switch as needed.
Bows: List from low to high
Guns: List from low to high
Crossbows: List from low to high
Your melee weapons are basically stat sticks. Don't worry much about two-handed versus dual-wielding; just go for the best combination of stat boosts you can get out of them.
Gems
Gems are mostly a reflection of your stat priorities. You'll of course want to meet the requirements for any meta gems first. If you don't care about your socket bonuses, gem for AP.
NOTE, 9/6/09: Agi has supplanted AP for some reason. I'm not sure on the math, but when AP goes bye-bye in 4.0, it's not going to matter anyway. I believe it has to do with more crits = more Piercing Shots procs, and more bleed damage is more damage.
Gear Notes
Marksman hunters, especially now that they get AP from Int via Careful Aim, should look for "of the Falcon" (Agi/Int) gear while leveling. Marksman has always been a mana-intensive playstyle, as well, so you'll want the mana, anyway. (The "of the Falcon" mail is stupidly expensive on the Bronzebeard Horde auction houses right now.) After that, Monkey (Agi/Sta) is the best option, then Tiger (Agi/Str), Wolf (Agi/Spi), or Eagle (Int/Sta). Straight up Agility or Attack Power doesn't hurt, either. Crit is good for a Marksman. You're not going to find much hit rating gear while leveling, so don't worry about that until you start getting closer to the top-end dungeons. I'd prioritize gear as Agi/AP, Crit, Int, Sta until you get to the point where hit rating and haste start to appear.
Ranged weapons are kind of spotty in old world leveling - they crop up a lot more (and in a lot more variety) once you get to Outland and Northrend. Questing, you'll find one every ten levels or so; if you run instances at level, you'll probably find upgrades more often. There are more bows than guns, but they're both fairly common; there are about half as many crossbows as either bows or guns, though. If you're not particular about which you use, you can carry some of either kind of ammunition and just switch as needed.
Bows: List from low to high
Guns: List from low to high
Crossbows: List from low to high
Your melee weapons are basically stat sticks. Don't worry much about two-handed versus dual-wielding; just go for the best combination of stat boosts you can get out of them.
Gems
Gems are mostly a reflection of your stat priorities. You'll of course want to meet the requirements for any meta gems first. If you don't care about your socket bonuses, gem for AP.
NOTE, 9/6/09: Agi has supplanted AP for some reason. I'm not sure on the math, but when AP goes bye-bye in 4.0, it's not going to matter anyway. I believe it has to do with more crits = more Piercing Shots procs, and more bleed damage is more damage.
- Red Gems: AP. If for some reason you can't immediately get an AP gem, an Agi gem is good in a pinch.
- Yellow Gems: Hit if you're not capped, crit if you are.
- Blue Gems: Don't get a purely blue gem. Pick up a green or purple gem instead.
- Orange Gems: AP/crit, AP/hit, depending on your hit rating. Similar to red gems, if you can't for some reason get an AP version, there are Agi versions to substitute until you can.
- Purple Gems: AP/Sta. There are Agi/Sta, AP/mp5, and Agi/mp5 gems if you can't get the AP/Sta one right away.
- Green Gems: Sta/crit, Sta/hit, depending on your hit rating.
Marksman 1-80 (Part 3: Stats)
I'm going to talk about gear next, so first I should probably talk about stats.
Stats
Hunters all generally look for the same stats: Agility (Agi), Intelligence (Int), Stamina (Sta), Attack Power (AP), Critical Strike Rating (crit), Hit Rating (hit), Haste, and Armor Penetration (not worth abbreviating). For PVE, a Marksman hunter looks for them in basically this order:
You don't need to worry about Strength or Spirit. If you see gear with Str and Agi on it, it's really meant for a melee DPS class. It's not terrible for you if it's the best you can get at the time, but you'll want to be looking for a way to upgrade to more useful stats. Spirit isn't common enough on hunter gear to be worth stacking, and our out-of-combat mana regen is terrible enough that it's just never going to be feasible to improve through Spi. You can also ignore Spellpower entirely, in all its flavors; it's not going to do anything for us. Spell penetration is similarly pointless (although it may still interact with some trap mechanics, that will eventually be fixed).
Stats
Hunters all generally look for the same stats: Agility (Agi), Intelligence (Int), Stamina (Sta), Attack Power (AP), Critical Strike Rating (crit), Hit Rating (hit), Haste, and Armor Penetration (not worth abbreviating). For PVE, a Marksman hunter looks for them in basically this order:
- Hit rating, until you reach 8%; this is about 165 hit rating with 3 points in Focused Aim at 80. This can mostly be ignored till you get past 70, at which point you'll want to start watching more for gear with hit rating. Leveling gear has pretty much none.
- Attack Power, but make sure you watch AP contribution from all sources when comparing gear. You get 1 point of AP per point of Agi (this was nerfed down from 2:1 I think in the 2.0 patch; it was towards the end of Vanilla WoW one way or anther); you should also be getting 1 point of AP per point of Int. If you're looking for a net gain in AP when you switch gear, make sure you calculate for the Agi and Int, as well. Sometimes prioritizing for AP means using pieces with less straight AP and more Agi and Int, because the overall AP gain is larger. Valuing pure AP over Agility is mostly true for gems and enchants; in straight up determination of gear, you'll want to take your crit rating into consideration.
- Agility, since it contributes both AP and crit. While leveling, you may want to value Agi over AP for it's crit contribution.
- Critical Strike Rating, since a Marksman hunter is a crit junkie. You should be getting 10% from talents by the time you get towards the end of the tree, so you're going to want to aim for a minimum of 30% on your character sheet at 80. You'll have more like 12% at around level 50.
- Intelligence, since it contributes AP and mana. You will always be a mana-reliant spec as a Marksman, so don't neglect it. (I used to enchant for it when BM was the favored spec and Int was scarce on hunter gear.)
- Haste, since your goal is 1.5 second cast Steady Shots (they used to be, until they were tweaked to be 2 second casts). The "soft cap" - the point at which you get 1.5 second Steady Shots just from haste contribution from gear - is 522 or 523, however you want to interpret the math. You're probably not going to see haste from gear until you get to Northrend, which is okay - you're probably going to be moving enough that you won't get the full benefit from it until you're doing dungeons regularly. Besides, 5 points in Improved Aspect of the Hawk with the Hawk glyph will more than haste cap you when it procs. Any extra haste just means extra Auto Shots (which is nothing to sneeze at - they add up); hunters' global cooldown can't be shortened from 1.5 seconds.
- Stamina, since it helps keep you and your pet alive. It's not something to ignore, but not something to stack for over things that make you hit harder or faster or more often.
- Armor Penetration, since hunter damage is mitigated so much by armor, isn't something to ignore; it's also not terribly common until you get to Northrend, and not worth stacking in the place of AP/Agi/Int/crit. If you're at the haste cap, you probably would benefit from picking up some armor penetration.
You don't need to worry about Strength or Spirit. If you see gear with Str and Agi on it, it's really meant for a melee DPS class. It's not terrible for you if it's the best you can get at the time, but you'll want to be looking for a way to upgrade to more useful stats. Spirit isn't common enough on hunter gear to be worth stacking, and our out-of-combat mana regen is terrible enough that it's just never going to be feasible to improve through Spi. You can also ignore Spellpower entirely, in all its flavors; it's not going to do anything for us. Spell penetration is similarly pointless (although it may still interact with some trap mechanics, that will eventually be fixed).
Marksman 1-80 (Part 2: Detailed Marksman Talent Notes)
Continuing the Marksman 1-80 information... This time I'm going to go through the Marksman tree's talent options.
Detailed Talent Notes
Improved Concussive Shot: Dazing talents can be nice while soloing (easier kiting), but when they took the stun proc off Improved Concussive Shot, I dropped the points from the talent. The stun was its entire appeal to me. But if you don't like some of the talents I've taken, they're not terrible choices for leveling.
Focused Aim: Although you might not pick it up right away, this is worth getting especially after you pick up Steady Shot at level 50. While soloing, you're more likely to have something jabbing at you while you're trying to cast it. The 3% hit rating is good as well, especially at higher levels when you're trying to get hit capped.
Lethal Shots: 5% crit is a must. Your first talent points will probably going here.
Careful Aim: Another talent you'll want eventually (your intelligence will be a solid AP boost), even if you don't get it right away.
Improved Hunter's Mark: Depending how much you like Hunter's Mark, this will buff it and make it cost nothing. There are better places to put your talents.
Mortal Shots: Increased crit damage is good. You need this to get Aimed Shot. Marksman hunters are big on crit.
Go for the Throat: This talent will keep your pet growling (or boost its DPS), dependent partly on your crit rating for usefulness. You'll want it for soloing to help keep stuff off you and on your pet.
Improved Arcane Shot: This is a talent you'll want to pick up at some point for the DPS boost. Arcane will be part of your rotation.
Aimed Shot: A must in the Marksman world. A mortal strike debuff for PVP, an instant, still somewhat hard-hitting shot. (Admittedly, it crits at 80 for about what it did at 70 when it was still a 3-second cast. Our burst is gone, but you still want the shot.)
Rapid Killing: This talent is useful for leveling in the next-shot damage boost you get from killing something. It's useful at the higher levels for the 3-minute cooldown on Rapid Fire.
Improved Stings: Something you'll want eventually - increased Serpent damage is increased Chimera damage.
Efficiency: Efficiency is a much debated talent - soloing, you'll want it. If you end up raiding at higher levels with persistent replenishment buffs, you can probably drop it. (I still have it in my raiding spec.)
Concussive Barrage: See Improved Concussive Shot. Not bad for PVP, not bad for kiting. You can't daze much of anything in a raid environment, so it's pretty useless there.
Readiness: This used to be a Survival talent; when they took Scatter Shot from us, this is what we got instead. It is awesome. This is a spare trap, back-to-back Rapid Fires, double Kill Shots, an emergency Feign, or whatever else you suddenly find yourself needing that's on cooldown. Plus, you want Trueshot Aura, right?
Barrage: This is another much debated talent, along with its followup. Its usefulness is partially going to be determined by whether or not you're using Aimed Shot in your rotation. (You should be.)
Combat Experience: A nice, solid talent. The extra Agility and Int are always nice. If I ever freed up any points in either of my specs, this is where they would go.
Ranged Weapon Specialization: 5% more damage is 5% more damage.
Piercing Shots: The bleed is a nice damage boost, and it'll keep rogues from restealthing. ;) (It's not a magic effect - it can't be Cloaked.)
Trueshot Aura: 10% AP boost is great. Death Knights and Enhancement Shamans can proc an equivalent buff, but this is persistent, and always useful.
Improved Barrage: Like its prerequisite, a debated talent. I love it for the uninterruptible Volley, and the crit boost is solid.
Master Marksman: This used to be an AP buff; now it's 5% crit and cheaper Steady Shots. Go for it.
Rapid Recuperation: A good leveling talent in conjunction with Rapid Killing, and nice for raiding because of its Rapid Fire component. I like it.
Wild Quiver: This is a nice damage boost - nature damage, to boot, so I believe it's not affected by armor as much.
Silencing Shot: Nice for soloing and PVP, and since it's off the global cooldown, you can use it as an extra damage pop in raiding, too. Also nice for instances and such where you have a caster you want to pull closer.
Improved Steady Shot: Not a bad talent, although you'll get more of a DPS boost out of Wild Quiver. Better for raiding than soloing, where you'll be in combat long enough to both get and use the proc.
Marked for Death: A good DPS boost if you remember to use Hunter's Mark. If you don't get it for a soloing spec, you'll want it for a raiding spec.
Chimera Shot: This will be your hardest hitting shot when you get it (besides Kill Shot). This is why you want to buff Serpent Sting as much as possible - the Serpent proc will easily keep this shot doing 5-8k on crits at 80.
Detailed Talent Notes
Improved Concussive Shot: Dazing talents can be nice while soloing (easier kiting), but when they took the stun proc off Improved Concussive Shot, I dropped the points from the talent. The stun was its entire appeal to me. But if you don't like some of the talents I've taken, they're not terrible choices for leveling.
Focused Aim: Although you might not pick it up right away, this is worth getting especially after you pick up Steady Shot at level 50. While soloing, you're more likely to have something jabbing at you while you're trying to cast it. The 3% hit rating is good as well, especially at higher levels when you're trying to get hit capped.
Lethal Shots: 5% crit is a must. Your first talent points will probably going here.
Careful Aim: Another talent you'll want eventually (your intelligence will be a solid AP boost), even if you don't get it right away.
Improved Hunter's Mark: Depending how much you like Hunter's Mark, this will buff it and make it cost nothing. There are better places to put your talents.
Mortal Shots: Increased crit damage is good. You need this to get Aimed Shot. Marksman hunters are big on crit.
Go for the Throat: This talent will keep your pet growling (or boost its DPS), dependent partly on your crit rating for usefulness. You'll want it for soloing to help keep stuff off you and on your pet.
Improved Arcane Shot: This is a talent you'll want to pick up at some point for the DPS boost. Arcane will be part of your rotation.
Aimed Shot: A must in the Marksman world. A mortal strike debuff for PVP, an instant, still somewhat hard-hitting shot. (Admittedly, it crits at 80 for about what it did at 70 when it was still a 3-second cast. Our burst is gone, but you still want the shot.)
Rapid Killing: This talent is useful for leveling in the next-shot damage boost you get from killing something. It's useful at the higher levels for the 3-minute cooldown on Rapid Fire.
Improved Stings: Something you'll want eventually - increased Serpent damage is increased Chimera damage.
Efficiency: Efficiency is a much debated talent - soloing, you'll want it. If you end up raiding at higher levels with persistent replenishment buffs, you can probably drop it. (I still have it in my raiding spec.)
Concussive Barrage: See Improved Concussive Shot. Not bad for PVP, not bad for kiting. You can't daze much of anything in a raid environment, so it's pretty useless there.
Readiness: This used to be a Survival talent; when they took Scatter Shot from us, this is what we got instead. It is awesome. This is a spare trap, back-to-back Rapid Fires, double Kill Shots, an emergency Feign, or whatever else you suddenly find yourself needing that's on cooldown. Plus, you want Trueshot Aura, right?
Barrage: This is another much debated talent, along with its followup. Its usefulness is partially going to be determined by whether or not you're using Aimed Shot in your rotation. (You should be.)
Combat Experience: A nice, solid talent. The extra Agility and Int are always nice. If I ever freed up any points in either of my specs, this is where they would go.
Ranged Weapon Specialization: 5% more damage is 5% more damage.
Piercing Shots: The bleed is a nice damage boost, and it'll keep rogues from restealthing. ;) (It's not a magic effect - it can't be Cloaked.)
Trueshot Aura: 10% AP boost is great. Death Knights and Enhancement Shamans can proc an equivalent buff, but this is persistent, and always useful.
Improved Barrage: Like its prerequisite, a debated talent. I love it for the uninterruptible Volley, and the crit boost is solid.
Master Marksman: This used to be an AP buff; now it's 5% crit and cheaper Steady Shots. Go for it.
Rapid Recuperation: A good leveling talent in conjunction with Rapid Killing, and nice for raiding because of its Rapid Fire component. I like it.
Wild Quiver: This is a nice damage boost - nature damage, to boot, so I believe it's not affected by armor as much.
Silencing Shot: Nice for soloing and PVP, and since it's off the global cooldown, you can use it as an extra damage pop in raiding, too. Also nice for instances and such where you have a caster you want to pull closer.
Improved Steady Shot: Not a bad talent, although you'll get more of a DPS boost out of Wild Quiver. Better for raiding than soloing, where you'll be in combat long enough to both get and use the proc.
Marked for Death: A good DPS boost if you remember to use Hunter's Mark. If you don't get it for a soloing spec, you'll want it for a raiding spec.
Chimera Shot: This will be your hardest hitting shot when you get it (besides Kill Shot). This is why you want to buff Serpent Sting as much as possible - the Serpent proc will easily keep this shot doing 5-8k on crits at 80.
5/13/09
Marksman 1-80 (Part 1: General Talent Notes)
I'm going to do this in chunks, because I've been writing it out and it's getting long. This won't be so much of a leveling guide as a Marksman guide. Leveling is pretty general - go to zones where you can get quests and don't die immediately walking out of town, and kill mobs and do quests. Leveling as a Marksman in particular, on the other hand, means knowing what you want for talents, what your skills are useful for, and what kind of gear you should be using. So then:
Marksman 1-80
A lot of people level as Beast Mastery. It's easy - send in the pet, turn on Auto Shot, let the pet do all the work. Marksman doesn't have to be hard, though. Leveling as a Marksman hunter can help you develop some skills useful later in the game, since you can't always count on your pet or your tank to hold every mob in a pull (and sometimes you don't want them to, either). Kiting and chain trapping will always be more in the realm of Survival, just because they have talents built towards minimizing snares on the hunter and maximizing traps. These skills can, however, be learned and developed as a leveling Marksman hunter.
General Talent Notes
I run with two Marksman builds; one is geared towards a generalist playstyle - soloing, casual PVP, instances - and the other is focused on raid DPS output. The former is the one you'll want to look at for a leveling or soloing build - 7/53/11. You'd probably want to do Marksmanship talents first until around when you've got Improved Barrage filled out, then pick up probably the Survival talents to get Scatter Shot. (Or, if you're impatient, toss the 7 points into Beast Mastery for a faster pet revive.)
Soloing Spec (7/53/11)
Raiding Spec (2/62/7)
Survival talents: Scatter Shot is fantastic in solo and small group play - it's short term crowd control, which you can use either to extend locking down a mob until your trap cooldown is back up, or use it to get a mob off your healer or a clothie until you can either get it trapped, or your tank picks it back up, or you can hit it with enough damage to pull it off to kite it. It's also another spell interrupt, and lasts long enough for most of a fast pet revive. Improved Tracking (5% more damage against most mobs), Hawkeye (another 6 yards of range), and Survival Instincts (4% less damage taken and 4% more crit for Arcane and Steady Shot) are good ways to get there.
Beast Mastery talents: Improved Revive Pet is awesome. If you're mostly soloing and your pet doesn't hold aggro well (and after a while, it probably won't, if your gear keeps up), use Endurance Training (10% more pet health, 5% more health for you) to get it, instead of Improved Aspect of the Hawk (10% chance to proc a haste boost) - you'll probably be kiting too much while soloing to really take advantage of the haste proc.
Next up: A more detailed look at Marksman talents.
Marksman 1-80
A lot of people level as Beast Mastery. It's easy - send in the pet, turn on Auto Shot, let the pet do all the work. Marksman doesn't have to be hard, though. Leveling as a Marksman hunter can help you develop some skills useful later in the game, since you can't always count on your pet or your tank to hold every mob in a pull (and sometimes you don't want them to, either). Kiting and chain trapping will always be more in the realm of Survival, just because they have talents built towards minimizing snares on the hunter and maximizing traps. These skills can, however, be learned and developed as a leveling Marksman hunter.
General Talent Notes
I run with two Marksman builds; one is geared towards a generalist playstyle - soloing, casual PVP, instances - and the other is focused on raid DPS output. The former is the one you'll want to look at for a leveling or soloing build - 7/53/11. You'd probably want to do Marksmanship talents first until around when you've got Improved Barrage filled out, then pick up probably the Survival talents to get Scatter Shot. (Or, if you're impatient, toss the 7 points into Beast Mastery for a faster pet revive.)
Soloing Spec (7/53/11)
Raiding Spec (2/62/7)
Survival talents: Scatter Shot is fantastic in solo and small group play - it's short term crowd control, which you can use either to extend locking down a mob until your trap cooldown is back up, or use it to get a mob off your healer or a clothie until you can either get it trapped, or your tank picks it back up, or you can hit it with enough damage to pull it off to kite it. It's also another spell interrupt, and lasts long enough for most of a fast pet revive. Improved Tracking (5% more damage against most mobs), Hawkeye (another 6 yards of range), and Survival Instincts (4% less damage taken and 4% more crit for Arcane and Steady Shot) are good ways to get there.
Beast Mastery talents: Improved Revive Pet is awesome. If you're mostly soloing and your pet doesn't hold aggro well (and after a while, it probably won't, if your gear keeps up), use Endurance Training (10% more pet health, 5% more health for you) to get it, instead of Improved Aspect of the Hawk (10% chance to proc a haste boost) - you'll probably be kiting too much while soloing to really take advantage of the haste proc.
Next up: A more detailed look at Marksman talents.
5/8/09
Raid UI
http://i664.photobucket.com/albums/vv7/duskhawk/WoWScrnShot_050709_213511.jpg
The numbers in Recount are from Archavon on Tuesday, mixed with whatever soloing I did on Wednesday, so they may not mean anything.
This is the UI that goes with the 2/62/7 build.
Addons
- oRa2
- Recount
- Omen
- DBM
- Viper Notify
- The Shot2 macro is:
#showtooltip
/castsequence Chimera Shot, Aimed Shot, Arcane Shot, Steady Shot, Steady Shot, Steady Shot
/use Handgrips of the Savage Emissary
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()
(The gloves being for the ROCKETS!!! Teehee.)
- The Misdirect macro is:
#showtooltip
/cast [button:1, target=focus] Misdirection; [button:2] Misdirection; [button:3, target=pet] Misdirection
/p Misdirecting... hope I click the right one!
I have an Intellimouse Explorer 3, so that's left, right, and middle mouse buttons.
- Other macros, all space savers:
/cast [button:1] Aspect of the Cheetah; [button:2] Aspect of the Pack
#showtooltip
/cast [button:1] Explosive Trap; [button:2] Immolation Trap
#showtooltip
/cast [button:1] Freezing Trap; [button:2] Frost Trap; [button:3] Freezing Arrow
#showtooltip
/cast Feed Pet
/use 3 1
#showtooltip
/cast [button:1] Mend Pet(Rank 8); [button:2] Revive Pet
- And the mount macro from WoWwiki:
/run C=CallCompanion if(not IsMounted())then if(((GetZoneText()=="Dalaran")and(GetSubZoneText()~="Krasus' Landing"))or(GetZoneText()=="Wintergrasp")or not IsFlyableArea())then C("MOUNT",57)else C("MOUNT",34)end end
/dismount
This uses the green nether ray and the orange raptor.
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