Jett Hunters 101

[Sedian]

ok, me and echo are going go over the difference between pve and pvp gear. Also what flasks, Arrows, and food buffs to bring to raids. As well we will also go over the different talent trees strengths and weakness, Shot Rotations and the new Pet Talent Trees implemented in the recent patch.

FLASKS
Flask of Relentless Assault-Adds 120 Attack Power and Stays buffed when you die this is a guardian and battle elixir, Lasts 2 Hours.
Arrows
FOR THOSE PPL WHO DONT HAVE REP WITH THE BELOW: Halla no rep required theres a ammo vendor there with bullets and arrows level 66 is needed best arrows you can get until you get the reputation needed below.

Some of the Best Arrows/Bullets in the game are accuired through reputationsCenarion Expedtion offers some pretty nice arrows: Wardens Arrows:37 dps,lvl 68 Required,Revered is needed

The Violet Eye offers Arrows you shoudent replace until scale of sands arrows: Mysterious Arrows: 46.5 dps, Revered lvl 70 Required

Scale of Sands Best Arrows in BC : Honored is needed to buy these lvl 70 required Need to do hyjal so dont really worry that much about these once hyjal is being ran i will go into more depth

FOOD BUFFS
Ravager Dogs: Gives you 40 AP and 30 Spirt
Warp Burgers: Gives you 20 Agility 30 Spirt

Talent Trees
BeastMastery
A.Strengths
-Good Overall Dps
-Easiest Hunter spec
-Most Viable in PVP & PVE
-Does not Require alot of gear restrictions(Stats,Gems,Etc...)
-Get to Tame Unique Pets(Some of these have unique abilities)
-Simple Straight Foward Shot Rotation
B.Weakness
-Very Much Pet Dependent
-Pet dies your Dps lowers
Marksmanship
A.Strengths
-Adds alot of Attack Power and Crit to your stats
-Very nice Burst Damage
-Very High Overall PVE DAMAGE
-Has a Differnent Approach then Beast Mastery
-Not Pet Dependent
B.Weakness
-Gear Restricted(Gems, Enchants, Etc...)
-Requires a More complex Shot Rotation
-Need at least 35% crit or more to be usefull
-NOT viable for PVP becasue of lost of scattershot
-Shot Rotation is a Mana Sucker
-Need the Gear to make Marksmenship Work
-A Very Hard Spec to play without experience
Survival
A.Strengths
-Improved Traps
-Exspose Weakness
-Higher Stamina/health
-More AP and Crit than bm less AP then marks even with crit
-Benefits the whole raid(thats what survival is usefull for)
B.Weakness
-Super Strict Gear Restrictions
-Need 800 Agility or more to make Survival work
-As survival your number 1 stat is to stack Agility up the ying yang
-Very Difficult shot rotation
-Low DPS(Below average until maybe t6)
-CRIT is a must in order to proc exspose weakness need to crit 4/5 times
-Traps are where most of your effects and abilities activate(MUST BE TRAPED FOR MORE DMG)
-OVERALL the hardest/Most unviable spec as a hunter

SUMMARY OF TALENT TREES
BeastMastery-SPEC REQUIRED TO START OUT UNTIL YOUR GEAR IS GOOD, ONLY SPEC THAT WILL SHOW RESULTS IN BAD GEAR
BeastMastery-EASIEST SPEC VIABLE FOR EVERYTHING YOU WANT TO DO
BeastMastery-HIGHLY RECOMNEED YOU STAY BEASTMASTERY UNLESS YOUR ADVISIOR TELLS YOU THAT YOUR STATS ARE HIGH ENOUGH TO TRY MARKS OR SURVIVAL EVEN THEN BEASTMASTERY USALLY ALWAYS PREVAILS

Marksmenship-HIGH DPS IN RAIDS,GEAR RESTRICTIONS ARE APPLYED, DO NOT RAID MARKS UNTIL YOU HAVE GOOD GEAR
Marksmenship-GOOD BURST DAMAGE VIABLE FOR PVE NOT PVP
Marksmenship-VERY INDEPENDENT ON YOURSELF NOT YOUR PET

Survival-BENEFICAL TO THE RAID,VERY GEAR RESTRICTED,AGILITY IS THE MAIN STAT,VERY DIFFICULT TO PLAY WELL
Survival-MUST BE ABLE TO CRIT 4/5 OF THE TIME TO KEEP EXSPOSE WEAKNESS UP
Survival-VIABLE FOR PVP MORE THAN PVE BECASUE TRAPS TRIGGER MOST OF THE SURVIVAL EFFECTS, IMPROVED TRAP

BEASTMASTER SPEC/SPECS
LVL 70
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classes/hunter/talents.html?tal=552000015050120531005113510050050 000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
THIS IS BC NOT WOTLK UPDATED YET!

[echohawk]

Sedian's given a fairly Hunter oriented end game bit of material.

I'm going to try and explain it all in general, least till I am too tired to continue tonight, so there may be edits. Yes I write lengthy, try to find a spot you need more information on and fixate on what interests you.

MACRO:

First of all, my shot rotation isn't a full secret. It's one that was advised a while ago by argoth. But I've adapted it slightly.

My personal experience has been to now post patch 3.0.2 is to only bother with the first part of the macro. It initially had two parts to use the kill command for your pet more consistantly, however that utility has changed so you might want to use it in a different variation. But with this macro you won't have to think to use it, which would be more beneficial during general leveling and grinding and farming type activities.

Original macro:
MACRO 1:

#showtooltip Steady Shot
/console Sound_EnableSFX 0
/cast !Auto Shot
/cast Steady Shot
/click [target=pettarget,exists] MultiBarBottomLeftButton12
/console Sound_EnableSFX 1
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()

MACRO 2:

/castsequence reset=4 Kill Command, !Auto Shot, !Auto Shot, !Auto Shot

The second macro must be placed in the last slot of your last action bar. If you have them on your screen like I prefer to, it will be bottom left action bar, last slot. Just left of the midway point on your reputation/experience bar. Please contact me immediately if you need assistance with this further.

Again, that isn't what I'm currently utilizing with end game raiding and more calculated activities. The kill command has a longer cooldown and instead of providing a small boost in damage, it gives you a certain amount of time to burn down the pets attacks. So if you use it say for something small like a critter, you'll have to wait for the cooldown to utilize it properly, cutting into precious dps. Or in more endgame terms, if you got turned to stone by gruul, you could have wasted that round of kill command while you were trapped. Its better to calculate it.

I currently use this macro: (put it anywhere you like and be sure to hit it a lot)

#showtooltip Steady Shot
/console Sound_EnableSFX 0
/cast !Auto Shot
/cast Steady Shot
/console Sound_EnableSFX 1
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()

More or less identical, just taking away that kill command line. But I do recommend experimenting with the shot roation as you like. I don't always use it unless i'm in raids with fights lasting more than a minute. Typically. Or you could be lazy and use it all the time, either way it'll work. However, if you want to excel in dps, don't completely rely on it as you may have to reapply other stings and various shots to keep up the raid. Find your style and blow em open.


FOOD:

I would encourage everyone to be self sufficiant. As wrath comes out, more recepies will be introduced. Food can assist through leveling, but most beneficially as an end game utility. Sedian posted a few foods hunter's should remain aware of. Mind you I tend to favor the ravager dogs myself..


PETS:
They can be simple or elaborate as you want em to be. In the number crunch of being the best you can be, its best to know all you can to benefit the most from your unique class companion.

In wrath they have released three types of pets,
Tenacity- tanking
Ferocity- dps
Cunning- dps/spell abilities
http://petopia.brashendeavors.net/
will tell you which particular pet family belongs to which. Ferocity put out the most damage typically, tenacity last longer and can maintain/re aquire threat better, and cunning have abilities that make fighting certain types of scenarios/mobs easier. You will have to research these yourself, as I'm not going to explain every darned one out here.

In short, pet fights for you, keeps mob safe distance away, pew pew, next. Oh and if you want a particular pet they do list the different ones on the site under the pet families. I do recommend it if you're into that kinda thing... like.. me...

[echohawk]

//Next to come\\
SPECS- BM,MM,or Surv (woah what?)
How to/not to huntard (Etiquette and just plain obvious things to retrain yourself out of bad habits)
PVP what can you do.. (for professional pvp, arena, bgs/ and surprise attacks)

And I'm sure some other topics will come to mind in time...

[echohawk]

So far I've had a few impressions left on me through the leveling process, (currently lvl 78, not at raiding mindset yet)

If you don't have a pet that's the same level as you, they don't tend to be able to retain threat as well as they should (ie. even if they're tenacity, tanking type, and you're a BM/ the big boast was you'd be able to go marksmanship and it would still hold threat, but I've definitely go my doubts)

My small recommendation there is to save a slot, particularly the one pet you're with to be dispensable. So every level you acquire you can re tame as you go along. It's also an easy way to feel out each of the different family of pets.

I highly recommend this, since certain pets are supposed to have the highest damage and so on and so forth, or certain unique abilities, but I'm finding out things like

-Core Hounds don't like to get close to their target (with or without lava breath on) so they can't seem to land the BM spell intimidation.
-Gorillas are good for volley operations, but their defense is readily sacrificed in a surrounded situation, so you might as well send them in with mend pet going and keep aspect of the viper up to continually spam healing and volley.
-Rhinos have a push-back ability, but this does not mean you can just let them jump into and tank a whole group without sustaining heavy damage, and you can't just volley the targets away since its not a group taunt like the gorilla.

Also you're a little behind the times if you still have your cat, as their damage has been, and I state this clearly with all the delicacy I can muster, severely reduced. Granted I still see, all the time, people steadfast with their feline pets. They're not worthless, but they're low on the damage they once topped.

I find actually that serpents, and wolves are very well suited towards the traditional, single target single kill single focus. And even if things get hairy, they can pick up any additional targets and resume damage on the initial one.

For some reason, the pet leveling system isn't working quite right, as it seems we, unlike the other classes must suffer through to level them as well (where as warlocks and so on have an auto level for their minions) which is why I found it far easier, especially when leveling just to re tame every level.



But for raid situations, I've done a little research on the side and in the endgame situation, two exotic pets are topping the charts for damage. <b>(BOTH are exotic, and require the talent to tame)</b>

~Chimera (recommending)
<A href='http://petopia.brashendeavors.net/html/skills/skills_froststormbreath.html'>Ability</a>
Type: Cunning (Mana replenishment)

~Core Hound (not as much)
<A href='http://petopia.brashendeavors.net/html/skills/skills_lavabreath.html'>Ability</a>
Type: Ferocity (DPS)

I myself will be going with a chimera. None are above level 70 really, so unfortunately I'm going to have to level it. Hopefully it will not be as hard as it seems once you're level capped.

[Sedian]

Today leveling your pets is easier if your pet is 5 levels below you it will level up to exactly 5 levels below you for instance if your getting a chimera like echo and your for example sakes are 80 and the chimera is 55 it will level up to 75.

[echohawk]

Looking at the meters, cat's are still topping. Damn Argoth and his bloody meow.
Watch me tame that spirit beast to just piss him off. Pah.
And when are you ever on Sedian? Honestly.

[Sedian]

what do you mean "when are you ever on" lol

[[Jett]-Aries]

she meant you are never on