Filed under: Hunter

Zach continues Monday's The Art of War(craft), which started an overview of the game's premier pet class by checking out their pets. Today, we'll take a closer look at the hunters themselves...

A hunter's basic repertoire of attacks consists of shots and stings, the former doing a variety of damaging effects and the latter applying a debuff. Although you only have to worry about one kind of sting being applied to you at any time, hunters have a sting for every kind of opponent. Serpent Sting is the most common, damaging sting, although they can also opt to use Viper Sting on mana-users or even Scorpid Sting against melee classes or other hunters. Stings are nature-based poison debuffs that can be removed by spells such as Cleansing Totems, Cleanse, and Cure Poison.

Most good hunters will try to keep a sting applied on a target, as it can confer benefits to the hunter beyond the basic debuff. Even with abilities to remove the debuff, stings can be reapplied almost immediately, so it can sometimes be a mana-intensive effort for both parties. Out of all the stings, hunters will protect and re-apply Viper Sting the most. On top of their sting, hunters also have a wide selection of ranged attacks. You can expect to be the target of their version of Mortal Strike, the marksmanship talent, Aimed Shot, or the Execute-like ability, Kill Shot, so always watch your health.

It's very difficult to get the element of surprise against a hunter, who will almost always have Track Humanoids active. Even against rogues, hunters have the option to use Flares, Track Hidden, and even Hunter's Mark if they get the chance. Tracking makes hunters ideal guards on flags in Arathi Basin or Warsong Gulch. Melee players should be wary of approaching a hunter because most will drop a Freezing Trap where they stand to counter rogue openers or warrior Charge.

Welcome to Pimp My Profile, the column in which the WoW.com staff turns zeroes into heroes. Don't think you're performing where you should be? Not sure how your class/spec is supposed to be gearing up? E-mail us with your Armory link, and you might be next to receive our help!

I would like to submit my character for the re-release of Pimp My Profile. I have a hunter named Fizzlebow, he's profiled for both Marksman and Beast Mastery, though I mostly play Marksman because I have more shots to choose from. I play 3-5 times a week, usually after work. I try to get in Heroic dungeon on the nights I do play, hopefully I can get two done a night. I usually group with my wife, another married couple, and one of their friends. I would be interested in any advice that I can receive towards my character to improve DPS. Depending on the heroic, I usually get somewhere between 1800 - 2300 DPS, and it feels like I should be getting more than that. Thanks for any info you and WoW.com can give, keep up the good work!

- Fizzlebow

Thank you for writing to Pimp My Profile Fizzlebow! You appear to be both deeply insightful as well as uncommonly good looking -- which is especially remarkable in your case since you don't have the rugged dwarven good looks to boost you. Marksman is indeed an excellent build to use in heroics, and I do believe if we roll up our sleeves we can jump your heroic DPS up considerably. We'd like to see you consistently doing over 3,000 DPS in any given heroic.

Best of all with higher DPS your runs will be faster than ever and I daresay your wife will be looking at you with new eyes and suggesting ways to spend that extra time!

Zach once sat down with Thrall and Varian Wrynn and had a laugh over some glasses of cold, green tea.

Two weeks ago we kicked off a series of introductory guides in PvP intended to give players a general idea of what to expect when facing certain classes. Understanding the behavior, capabilities, and limitations of a class puts players off to a great start in PvP, and after discussing the druid and the death knight in the first two installments, we now turn our attention to the hunter. Hunters have long been a force to reckon with in the Battlegrounds, an environment where they thrive. Also, as strong as they were back in vanilla WoW, they're even more powerful in Wrath of the Lich King, gaining new tricks, losing old limitations (e.g., traps can be deployed in combat), and having access to diversity of pets that make PvP encounters more interesting than ever.

Hunters are the game's premier pet class. More than even warlocks, hunters rely on their pet to accomplish their goals, with the best hunters mastering the art of micromanaging their pets and its varied abilities. Recognizing a hunter's spec is only aspect of identifying a hunter's strength and weaknesses. Part of learning how to deal with hunters involves recognizing a hunter's pet type who now even have their own talent trees. Let's take a closer look at this master of beasts after the jump.

Welcome to Scattered Shots, written by Frostheim of Warcraft Hunters Union and the Hunting Party Podcast. Each week Frostheim uses logic and science mixed with a few mugs of Dwarven Stout to look deep into the Hunter class.

It is well known that hideous undead monstrosities concocted by the deranged minions of the Lich King make for excellent target practice. Having rained death throughout the ICC Lower Spire and gathered up all of our rightful hunter loot, our next stop on the way to the Lich King is the Plagueworks. We are given more trash to shower us with Ashen Verdict rep, including the much sought-after Precious's Ribbon (clearly hunter loot) before stepping into the chamber of the grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous undead of yore.

Join me after the cut as we take a look at the hunter tips for defeating the bosses of the Plagueworks. As always, we're going to assume that you're familiar with the boss strategies and will be looking at hunter-specific tips.

As you may recall, Blizzard announced their intent to get rid of consumable ammo in Patch 3.1, only to withdraw the change a short time later, with the promise of reimplementing it at a nebulous later date. Now, it's been more or less assumed that said later date is Cataclysm itself, or at least Patch 4.0.

In a general forum post created to discuss ammo replacements, Ghostcrawler piped in to remind us that the only change announced for Cataclysm was the removal of ammo, with nothing else yet decided (or, more accurately, announced). While he did acknowledge the possibility of adding in new situational ammo, he did observe that the hassle of collecting and swapping different ammo types might grow old pretty quickly, especially for a class like the hunter that already needs to push a lot of buttons to play at peak potential, in addition to already having a pet to manage.

Welcome to Scattered Shots, written by Frostheim of Warcraft Hunters Union and the Hunting Party Podcast. Each week Frostheim uses logic and science mixed with a few mugs of Dwarven Stout to look deep into the Hunter class.

ICC Lower Spire offers four separate opportunities for hunters to shine like the radiant beacons of death we are. In addition to the normal assortment of target switching and void zone dancing in boss fights, we even have an encounter that has many raid leaders on their knees and begging for more hunters!

So step with me beyond the cut and through the doors of Icecrown Citadel for a look at how to optimize your hunter performance on the first four speed bumps in the path to the Lich King.

Welcome to Pimp My Profile, the column in which the WoW.com staff turns zeroes into heroes. Don't think you're performing where you should be? Not sure how your class/spec is supposed to be gearing up? E-mail us with your Armory link, and you might be next to receive our help!

Hi, I'm 80 and I've been so for weeks. I've been running random heroics for gear and I followed your guides for my pet specs (though I think I messed up on my Tenacity). My DPS barely cracks 1000. As far as I know, as a hunter, there is almost no excuse for this. Please help me.

-Shippleton

Thanks for writing in, Shippleton. You are wise enough to understand that your DPS is lower than it should be and intelligent enough to ask questions. It seems likely that you are also uncommonly good-looking, a trait shared by most hunters. You are to be applauded for taking the first step down the road to becoming a death dealer, which is the right of every hunter!

Right off the bat 1k DPS seems sufficiently low that I suspect we should be taking a look at your shot rotation as well as your talents and gear. In the interest of science I went ahead and ran Utgarde Pinnacle heroic with some extremely understanding friends while I was completely naked except for my gun, shirt, and tabard. My lack of mana kept me in viper for about 50% of the fights, and I ended up at about 1,100 DPS for the run. So that gives us an absolute bottom DPS benchmark.

We here at WoW.com are on a Daily Quest to bring you interesting, informative and entertaining WoW-related links from around the blogosphere.

• This week's EU forum watch brings you the best of the official forums, European style.
• OutDPS has a cure for the lagging hunter pet, increasing their DPS by a bit.
• Shields Up really likes the two piece tier 10 bonus on the resto shaman set.
• Killing 'em slowly looks at his elemental shaman twink gear.
• The German WoW fansite buffed.de is collecting photos of the players and their avatars for a large gallery. Go check it out and contribute if you want!
• Cynwise's Battelgrounds takes a look at heirloom gear for the lowbie battleground player.

Welcome to Scattered Shots, written by Frostheim of Warcraft Hunters Union and the Hunting Party Podcast. Each week Frostheim uses logic and science mixed with a few mugs of Dwarven Stout to look deep into the Hunter class.

We all know how painful PUGs can be. The DPSer doing less damage than you could do naked; the retadins and mages that open up immediately and pull aggro on everything; the tanks that still degroup the instant you land in Oculus or can't hold aggro on anything and ignore the mob eating the healer's face off; and of course the foolish healers that don't prioritize healing your pet above all else.

We talk a lot about optimizing our hunters for raids, and we're going to continue to do so. However a lot of hunters don't have raid access and are taking advantage of the new Dungeon Finder to run heroics until their feet are bloody and their gun barrels melt. So today we're going to take some time to talk about the facets of doing good heroic DPS, and about being a good heroic group member in general.

So join me after the cut as we take a look at how your shot rotations change in heroics, examine mana conservation, and generally discuss how to be a good group member.

The Colosseum takes us inside the world of the Gladiator (Relentless, Furious, Deadly, Brutal, Vengeful, Merciless, and otherwise), to interview some of the top Arena fighters on the battlegroups. Our goal is to bring a better understanding of the strategy, makeup, and work that goes into dueling it out for fame, fortune, and Frostwyrms. We're especially focused on the people who play these games, to further shed light on the world of the PvP player. If you'd like to be interviewed for The Colosseum, please feel free to contact us -- be sure to include your armory as a link!

We're in for a real treat this week. We interviewed Jhazy of Blackrock, one of the few players in arena history to achieve a 3,000 rating in 3v3. More impressive yet, he's done this on the very competitive Bloodlust battlegroup, and is currently holding that #1 spot by a margin of more than one hundred points. Jhazy's team STRAIGHT TO THE TOP is a protection warrior + marksman hunter + holy paladin composition. As a team, they are holding down the world's #1 3v3 spot!

Check out what Jhazy has to say after the break!

Hunters and warlocks were given something to look forward to during the Blizzard developer chat on twitter this evening. The question was asked: "You mentioned pet scaling being added for patch 3.3 but due to time constraints, was delayed. Will this be in the next patch?" This is something that has been mentioned throughout the course of the Wrath of the Lich King expansion and hasn't been implemented yet. The reason? It is a fairly complicated procedure.

We'll try to do what we can. Technically it's just more challenging than you might think. For Cataclysm, we have on our list that 100% of stats scale. If they don't then certain stats just won't be as valuable for pet classes. At the very least, we can do stuff like convert your X into damage for the pet so every stat is valuable. Getting everyone to scale with every stat better is a major goal for the class team for Cataclysm.

With hunters, warlocks, and unholy death knights, there are a lot of talents and glyphs that affect the scaling of stats to your pet. If you allow certain stats to scale too well, you suddenly unbalance the class. If the stat scales poorly, then the class falls in the other direction. Every talent and ability that taps into these has to be checked to make sure it doesn't throw things out of whack. Considerations on diminishing returns on certain stats scaling would also need to be checked.

Overall, there is a lot of number crunching and statistical analysis involved in trying to find the right balance between all of the knobs that they need to adjust. However, the frustration of out-gearing your pet will hopefully be behind us either in an upcoming patch or (more realistically) when Cataclysm hits.

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World of Warcraft: Cataclysm will destroy Azeroth as we know it. Nothing will be the same. In WoW.com's Guide to Cataclysm you can find out everything you need to know about WoW's third expansion. From Goblins and Worgens to Mastery and Guild changes, it's all there for your cataclysmic enjoyment.

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Welcome to Scattered Shots, written by Frostheim of Warcraft Hunters Union and the Hunting Party Podcast. Each week Frostheim uses logic and science mixed with a few mugs of Dwarven Stout to look deep into the Hunter class.

Last week we took a look at all the ICC hunter loot that could be purchased or crafted, as well as a bit of discussion about how the ICC itemization impacts hunters and the hunter specs.

This week we're going to dive in headfirst and dig through the piles of boss loot and see what gear comes out on top. I should note right off the bat that we have no idea at all what kind of loot the Lich King himself is hoarding. I wouldn't be surprised to find his loot is a higher iLevel than the rest of ICC, and likely what he has to offer will stomp the equivalent slot gear into a gooey gnome puddle. And no, he will not be dropping Frostmourne, though if he did I think we can all agree that a soul-devouring blade that corrupts and controls you is clearly a hunter weapon.

So join me after the cut as we take a look at Quel'delar, the Ashen Verdict rings, and everything else that drops in ICC worth looking at!

Welcome to Scattered Shots, written by Frostheim of Warcraft Hunters Union and the Hunting Party Podcast. Each week Frostheim uses logic and science mixed with a few mugs of Dwarven Stout to look deep into the Hunter class.

Okay, maybe it's not all hunter loot -- certainly there are some useless plate pieces and decorative maces in there -- but our ICC loot shopping list is delightful and vast, and even impacts the balance of hunter specs. This is the end game loot folks. The last major raid instance with the coolest and shiniest and bestest toys we're gonna get (and some bows).

In fact, there's just so darned much hunter loot delight that it won't all fit into one post! So join me after the cut as we start to plan our ICC loot lists with a look at our itemization, tier 10 armor, Emblem of Frost options, and craftable loot.

We here at WoW.com are on a Daily Quest to bring you interesting, informative and entertaining WoW-related links from around the blogosphere.

• Omen of DOOM! moonkin DoT clipping over at Revelart's Druid Reliquary
• OutDPS answers the hunter question: What Am I Doing Wrong!?
• Too Many Annas gives advice about Romantic RP.
• A slight old, but good post by Mystic Chicanery about warlocks and painting the ceiling beige.
• Spicytuna talks about frost mages facing Lady Deathwhisper.

Want to crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentation of their women? Blood Sport investigates the entirety of all-things arena for gladiators and challengers alike. C. Christian Moore, multiple rank 1 gladiator, examines the latest arena strategy, trends, compositions and more in WoW.com's arena column.

Listening Music: Miles Davis and John Coltrane's beautiful "So What." We featured the Smashing Pumpkins last week. This week, we'll be shifting gears to some brilliant jazz. You have to love the diversity Blood Sport offers in pwning music.

Last Week: Part IV of our Arena Guide for Beginners. We talked about the marks of a skilled healer inside an arena battle.

This Week: Not surprisingly, today's article will be structured in a very similar fashion to our last for our bloodthirsty DPS readers. More after the break!