Feral...ism?

That's right - something not related to Hunters?! Sacrilege! But s'true. I've had a Drood at level 40 for some months now, and I decided "Well I've got DPS covered. Problem is, so does a not-at-all-pulled-out-of-thin-air 87.62 percent of the player population."

After seeing months and months of "lf healer and tank" in every channel I have access to I figured it couldn't hurt to have a class at level 70 that could fill those roles, and that's where I've been spending my time lately.

Druids are a unique beast. It's the only class in the game that you could throw five of in a single party and have a (reasonably) well-balanced group: the basic roles of tank, healer, melee dps, and ranged dps all covered. Plus you could skip huge chunks of instances entirely if you felt so inclined... of course you have very limited crowd control and no removal of magic debuffs, but meh.

And stealth is incomparably fun.

Brain Mouse Tuesday

My Vanadium theorizes that I say random things because there is in fact a tiny mouse lost inside my skull, randomly chewing on synapses in search of its lost cheese.

Today the Brain Mouse has taken control of my blog.

1) Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is reeeally good.

2) Dollar Store books are often quite excellent. Helps you remember there are more than just 3 big name authors out there with a lot of talent.

3) The ones that aren't excellent are horrendous. There is no middle ground.

4) Nobody sells .3 mm mechanical pencil lead.

5) I have a little over 2400 gold now. Maybe someday I'll have a flying epic.

6) There is no number 6. This is because it is hiding in its room, terrified of number 7. Why?

Because 7) 8) 9).

Ein und vierzig (or) How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Readiness

It was once said to me:

SV has something not a lot of specs for any class has. Redundancy.

From your ramblings it appears as if you aren’t spec’d to do anything but recover from your mistakes/resists.

Lots of talents there to make traps better - faster cooldowns can conceivably be construed as redundancy, since they certainly aren't necessary for a competent chain-trapper... one with a cooperative group, anyway.

Likewise, Counterattack - it serves precisely the same purpose as Wing Clip, in the end, particularly with points in the Improved version.

But really, one point in the tree stands out more than the others, and I speak of course of Readiness.

Ah, Readiness.

In order to examine the skill, you have to examine its effects - in this case, the Hunter skills that are reset when you click that button. Purely by coincidence, I have a list.

Raptor Strike
Arcane Shot
Concussive Shot
Distracting Shot
Scare Beast
Traps
Multi-Shot
Aimed Shot
Deterrence
Disengage
Rapid Fire
Counterattack
Mongoose Bite
Viper Sting
Volley
Wyvern Sting
Tranquilizing Shot
Kill Command
Misdirection

Immediately you will see that some of them are more worth the 5-minute cooldown than others. Some of the skills above have longer cooldowns in proportion to elevated levels of usefulness, and its these that are what make Readiness so great. I feel I can say without fear of contradiction that several of the skills up there, like Kill Command and Distracting Shot, are criminal wastes of such a beauty of a talented skill.

I'll begin with the obvious: Feign Death. I've used this once or twice to escape repair bills, but only if I am the last person standing and there is absolutely no chance of victory. Why? 'cause it will piss your party members off if you FD too early and they get eaten. Even if they would die anyway, it's worth it to me to take the death so I can share in their frustration rather than being a target of their resentment.

Next: Traps. Specifically Freezing Trap. Burning Readiness to fix that big yellow "Resist" is a perfectly valid use of the skill, especially when the mob you are trapping is of the variety that will two-shot you. This can also be used with some creativity to trap 3 mobs simultaneously for up to 26 seconds, giving your party a head start on whatever is left. You can also release an Ark-worthy flood of serpents with a triple Snake Trap, or effectively nuke a crowd of weak mobs with a triple Explosive Trap.

Double Deterrence is also very useful in the proper circumstances - Deterrence and Aspect of the Monkey together turn you into a bona fide untouchable Mongoose Biting Counterattacking pain in the keister. People are wont to cry "But! Overpower!" at which point I'll kindly point out that Hunters are already Dodge machines, and you're likely already getting Overpowered every 6 seconds as it stands - dodging damn near every other attack they make will still reduce the damage you suffer considerably while you wait for that canary yellow Counterattack proc to fly up on your screen.

Much of what remains is a large variety of short cooldowns - most under 10 seconds. A few of them may be worth Readinessing (Readinessing? Did he say Readinessing?) at your discretion - Concussive Shot is a good choice for this, as is Multi-Shot. It's one of the strongest shots we have, and it can help you load on the damage to a group of enemies before they separate.

Scare Beast - another good one. Fearlock that Druid or Shaman; 18 continuous seconds of Fear is more than enough time for a Hunter to lay on some serious hurt. Less useful in PvE, since Fear is an undesirable method of crowd control, but I'm sure you can find a use for it somewhere.

Viper Sting - Good for giving that caster a piece of your mind in a hurry, 2700 mana gone with no reprieve is nothing to sneeze at even in this world of 10k+ mana pools.

And we come to one of my favorites: Rapid Fire. Combine Rapid Fire with one of the garden-variety attack power trinkets and you become a force to be reckoned with... combine it with a Haste Rating trinket to become a shrapnel-spitting death blur with a thirst for blood.

Or as only some of the 6.52% can do it - first one, then the other.

World of Significant Othercraft

In other news, my wife (owner of the cooking blog in my links section) who also loves WoW, did this the other day:


Booyah! <3

D:

It's been a few days since I've made a post, yes. I'm not going anywhere, I've just been distracted lately - my grandmother passed away earlier this week, and of course it's weighing on me.

It certainly wasn't a surprise, this has been coming for a while... but you're never really ready for it.

Ah well.

BRB

Variance

First, I realize my bizarre build isn't for everyone. I've sacrificed ranged DPS to round out my Hunter's skill set; to allow her to survive in melee combat if necessary and to become a serious candidate for primary CC in instances.

If you aren't comfortable with this, that's completely fine. The above build is a dedicated ranged DPS machine designed to do as much damage as a Survival build is capable of doing while also maintaining the raid-feeding Expose Weakness proc which will make physical DPS classes the world over love you to death.

Key talents:

Marksmanship

Lethal Shots - 5% crit. You know you love it.

Imp. Hunter's Mark - the effect of this stacks with Expose Weakness.

Rapid Killing - Rapid Fire. Know it. Love it.

Mortal Shots - Like I need to go in depth on this one.

Survival

X Slaying - Free damage is rarely bad.

Hawk Eye - Since you're in this tree anyway, if you skip it I'll slap you.

Blah blah traps, blah blah deterrence. Good place for filler points since it adds CC and survivability.

Surefooted - Important for the +3% to hit. This will allow you to wear slightly less +hit gear in favor of slightly more +ap gear, meaning more damage overall.

Survival Instincts - In addition to reducing damage taken, it also now increases your RAP by 4%.

Killer Instinct - I hear you say you want more crit? Well then.

Lightning Reflexes - AGILITY = LIFE

Expose Weakness - the great equalizer. Any damage a Marksman or even a Beastmaster has on you in The Meters (dramatic score) will be made up here. All that attack power multiplied by the number of physical DPSers in your raid... c'est formidable.

Wyvern Sting - a filler point, but it's a great Squishy-saver if your traps are currently occupied.

Master Tactician - A ranged-attack proc'd bonus to crit chance. What's not to love? With this up I have 34% crit chance, and that's in my quested blue gear. Plus it's a prerequisite to Readiness.

Readiness - Is it good? Oh yes. I need to do a post on this detailing why it's so great.

"What, no mana-saving talents?" I hear you whisper. Nope, not a one. Quick answer: use Aspect of the Viper. Long answer: Take 15 seconds out of your DPS time and drink some water if you need to. We can leave combat whenever we please without blowing a 5-minute cooldown to do so, and it's a tremendous boon. Not on top of The Meter? Wrong blog.

Happy 4th!

First, happy 4th of July! Whee, hooray, fireworks and all that!

Second, another word on damage. I remembered to SS my dps meter after the mech run I did last night.
That's an Affliction 'lock in #2 spot, and a Rogue of unknown spec in #3. I'm going to make the disclaimer that our tank was kind of sub-par and the only member that could go all-out DPS without dying (thank you Feign Death) was me... but if you think for a second that that's not part of a Hunter's bag of DPS tricks, you're most definitely wrong.

Nethermancer Sepethrea is a really difficult fight, as anyone who's been there can attest to. She herself hits like a little girl, but kiting those elementals while DPSing is a formidable task.

BRK's favorite trick of doing the Nethermancer pull from Panthaleon's room is unfortunately no longer possible. She'll reset as soon as she sets foot on the bridge, meaning you have to fight her where she stands and deal with kiting those bloody elementals in that tiny room.

Panthaleon was kind enough to drop half of my Arcatraz key, and this little beauty: Abacus of Violent Odds. Having two Rapid Fires I can call on anytime I like is just too delicious.

Master of CC

I had originally planned to whip out my Fraps (in public!) and make a video demonstrating the insane short-term CC Survival Hunters are capable of, but someone has mostly beat me to the punch:



Just crazy.

Add to this the fact that you can pet-tank a sixth mob and Scare Beast (if applicable) yet another, and you're talking seven simultaneously crowd controlled mobs. Practical? Perhaps not.

Sweet as all get out? .... ohhhhh yeah.

Survivalism II

In the first installment of the Survivalism post series, I discussed my spec in-depth. It has changed slightly - I exchanged Monster Slaying, Entrapment and Go for the Throat for Deflection and Savage Strikes.

I know, I know. The much-lauded BRK would probably slap me and steal all my BRK Cool Points for enhancing my melee skills at the cost of my pet, but... screw him. This is my spec. There are many like it, but this one is mine.

One of the things I've tried to shoot for is extreme versatility. My traps cool down before they end, meaning I can keep a mob trapped in perpetuity -- there is zero time required for the mob to chase after me, enabling me to do two things most hunters cannot: emergency-trap a mob standing right next to the healer without consideration of threat (bad, bad strategy, but sometimes necessary), and trap casters. If you lay a trap at the feet of a frozen mob it will go into effect immediately, refreshing the duration of the trap, meaning I can keep him trapped as long as I'm able to stand still.

A word on damage: I've run quite a few instances since the last Survivalism post, running SW Stats the whole time. I was the #1 damage dealer throughout the entire instance every time but twice - a fire mage and one epic Rogue managed to outdo me (with the help of MY Expose Weakness!). And I don't even have Mortal Shots! Don't listen to those who tell you Survival is broken and worthless; they have no facts to back it up. Give them an RS crit + Counterattack combo from me, with bells on, and then fill them full of arrows.

Speaking of things Marksmen and Beastmasters can't do - I've Deterrence tanked the last few percent of Warlord Kalithresh during his +100% attack speed tantrum after we missed an aquarium and the tank bit it. That was satisfying, oh yes. Mmmm. Sweet justification.

Survival hunters are also more than capable of being a primary crowd control class. I can't remember the last time a mob resisted one of my traps and there wasn't something I could do about it, and resisting two of my traps in a row is unheard of - and even if they do, so what? If you make sure the party waits for your cooldown before the pull, you get two traps right off the bat. If the second trap sticks, great, your cooldown will STILL be up before the trap ends, and if it somehow magically resists the second trap, Readiness will be there to save the day.

This isn't a discussion of basic Hunter strategy, but rather specific things that can be done with a heavy Survival spec. If you need such a thing, go visit BRK and read through his extensive collection of "L2HUNTR" posts and weep as he shows you how you've been wrong all this time.