BM vs MM in raidsFollow

I don't know about everyone else but I have yet to be out damaged by a BM or SV hunter in instances and kara. Maybe I am better geared but I doubt it. I think you have to take their skill into account. BM is easy to play but hard to master and SV is just hard all around. I like MM because I don't rely on my pet as much as a BM hunter. In kara I like having both BM and MM hunter for the buffs.

"A BM hunter's main source of dps is Serpent's Swiftness, not a pet.".......something i picked up from a diff thread...70MM to BM i think...
this seems totally opp to what you have been saying..i am confused..who is right?

The problem with the statements to this point regarding BM's dying more often than MM's is that the issue is one of play style, skill, and experience, not the spec itself.

As an example, I was doing a 5-man (ZF) the other night. The group was a 51 druid/tank, 50 BM hunter, 49 Priest, 48 MM hunter, and me, a 45 BM hunter. Everyone but me died once during the instance, and the 50 hunter died twice. In addition I was also second in total individual (non-pet) damage (the druid beat me by about 15%), and I was easily first in total damage (meaning when you include the pet). Right from the start my individual damage was about 25% higher than either of the other hunters, and believe me, I wasn't even particularly trying to be the damage leader, I was just playing my class.

So why the huge difference in damage and survivability? Simple, I am a highly experienced player. With over 8 million people playing this game, 7.5 million of which are not experienced MMO players, with BM hunters being so popular of a class, and with all the grouping and learning issues inherent to playing a "solo" class in a group, it is inevitable that many hunters are crappy players in groups.

Does this mean that there is an inherent issue with the BM spec and it's survivability? Heck no! It is just an inherent problem with anyone new to grouping/raiding, and there are more of those among BM spec hunters than any other class. This same issue took place with Necromancers in EQ, and yet at the same time easily the best and most powerful player I ever grouped with in EQ was a Necro who chose to almost always group rather than solo. He was a master of crowd control, group tactics, aggro management, damage dealing, and virtually everything else vital to effective playing of the game.



BTW, I have only been playing WoW for 3.5 weeks now, I have soloed 98% of the time so far, I had never been in a group bigger than 3 before, and I had never done an instance with a group before either. Despite all this my grouping skills and my understanding of my class was apparently far greater than either of the other hunters. This is despite the fact that the 50 hunter groups for instances almost every night.

So what makes an inexperienced WoW player like me so much better? First, I research my class so I understand how to play it and how to equip my character. Second, I have played a dozen different MMORPG's over the last 7 years, including the single hardest MMORPG ever, EQ during its first year. If you didn't have great grouping skills in that game you didn't get anywhere, and so you learned them or you died constantly.


Anyway, what it all comes down to is research, practice, and common sense. Those who do/have all these things will do better and will live longer. Those who don't will be a massive pain in your butt and will die a lot and cause plenty of wipes... That is just how these games work, and your particular spec is only a marginal factor in the question of who does the most damage or who dies the least.

Nice idea, but impossible in actual play, thus my point. You guys can discuss theorycraft until you are blue in the face and all p/o'd at each other and you'll have accomplished absolutely nothing. Theorycraft does not perfectly allow for reality, it makes a passing wave at it and depending on the assumptions made to come up with the numbers (Even Az has to make assumptions for all that incredible math) will determine how close it comes to actual play but then again, it can all be wiped out by a bad day or too much caffiene.



The only opportunity I'm seeing provided here is the one that torque's people off and accomplishes little save to outline some relatively minor differences. Perhaps against a CERTAIN Boss, or in a CERTAIN instance, one spec might have some advantage, but the other spec might excell in other areas. Again, DPS is *NOT* the only measure of a hunter and the title of this thread is which spec is best in a raid and not all raids are the same or need the same thing from a hunter. If you are only focused on DPS you are only looking at theorcraft because, as you agreed with me, skill has far more of an impact.




Glad I could bring some levity to your day, just because I made you laugh doesn't mean it isn't true.



Please do not attempt to tell me how Blizzard works only Blizzard and it's employees and staff know that at any given moment. I've had enough friends work for them to know what they attempt to do operationally, both in development and playtesting, but as with all game companies, this changes on a need basis. Focus shifts all the time.

I have also assisted on the development of another on-line game that had a sizable on-line following (not the size of WoW, but it was popular). It's balancing issues were just as difficult as WoW's as it too had many races and equipment/technology variants. It also had a huge built-in Fan Base to please. The developers chose to create an inner circle of players that I was a member of. We actually did much of their alpha testing and balance testing. We had our own server, our own test environments and our own direct interfaces to the developers. I'm not sure how much I can divulge because I'm under a Non-Disclosure agreement regarding them. I'm fairly certain Blizzard would have such a group as well.



I never said any of this or alluded to any kind of perfection from Blizzard. I can pretty much garantee you that they have enough staff and volunteers to find any super 'I Win' skill/talent before it hits production release. Now, convoluted or clever uses of such things by smart players to gain that essential effect might take time to find and I'm sure once discovered it gets fixed ASAP. It is not in Blizzard's interest to make any one race, class or spec have some major advantage over the other, and that is what I was saying. Please don't take a simple concept to the extreme.


To clearly restate, the 'spec war' can go on forever, it will be subject to the whims of balancing and changes with each revision. I feel you guys are arguing over such minor differences as to be almost comical.

The easiest way to tell balance is (over-)simply this:

Which spec gets more invites to which raids or instances?
Which spec is easier to level with?
Which spec has a larger following of skilled players?

That will TEND (note: TEND, not actually BE) the spec to play (for master players) if it's the same spec across all the questions. If not, then you will likely prove the point that design against player skill should more properly drive the spec than pure DPS. Not all players can play a good Beastmaster. Not all players can play a good Marksman. Therefore those that can't will be crippling themselves and their party in both DPS, CC and all the other hunter skills by trying to play some 'optimum' talent build they can't pull off.

Build for yourself, play it and report back how well it works for you. If someone else tries it and it blows for them, then they should just state that without accusations, "I couldn't make it work for me." It's perfectly valid. To state "BM is always better than MM." is subjective and inappropriately definite. To rag on someone who has success and you don't with a given spec is pure ego. To assume your spec is the best is also pure ego. Player ability defines spec... that is all I am saying.

That's my opinion and I'm stickin' to it until something better comes along... lol!

Hey, slammerofkooter, I know how you should try to get your point across: put in a bunch of fake swear words and insult the people having a (somewhat) civil conversation here. Some of them may be trying to convince each other of things that the other won't be convinced of, but that's besides the point. Conversations like this are mostly good, because you can hear what experienced players have to say about things and adjust your play accordingly. Caldone, for instance, agrees with you in a sort of way, but he isn't an ***, so I take what he says with some weight. Perhaps I should pay more attention to bandages and healing pots and such.

I have been a BM since the first day I started this game. So I think I know the BM spec relatively well. And you cannot be serious when you think that my pet is the MAIN source of my damage. Klaus does not hit like a truck. He will do about the same damage as the main tank in an instance, but he's lucky if he's 30% of my damage. Significant? Yes. I think you don't understand what "majority" means, though.

And saying BM hunters or their pets need more healing is plain stupid. Any pet doing melee will take damage. It's called AoE. And if my pet takes aggro off the tank, he deserves to die because I've been stupid. If my pet is doing the same damage as the tank, how will that pull aggro? Even with growl on (which it shouldn't be), it isn't enough to compensate for the tank's equal damage and increased threat-generating abilities. And, ideally, a BM pet will have the higher armor talent, so that is less damage.

You then go on to generalize about how BM Hunters play compared to other classes. Please, do not generalize in this way. I do not fall into this category, nor do any of the other BM Hunters I have come across. In fact, I've been lucky enough to not come across any truly bad Hunters yet. I've encountered Mages and Rogues and Moonkin Druids that have a habit of pulling threat from the tank, but Hunters have this nice little ability called feign death that should put aggro back on the tank. I use it if I do pull threat - ideally, I use it before I pull threat. I do not try to top the damage meter. I go into an instance or raid with the mindset "I will be polite to these people, I will have fun, and I will play my class well enough that they will want me back." If I unload every fight and constantly pull aggro, they will not be impressed. I just started raiding Kara - I did not pull aggro once, and although my damage was simply OK, I was careful not to pull aggro. There was a fire Mage in the group that used a lot of AoEs and died a lot because he pulled aggro. Should I generalize and say all fire Mages are going to die all the time because they can't control their threat? I think I'd sound stupid if I did. You said the same thing about BM Hunters.

I know I touched on this already, but I really have to go back to it since it's so illogical.



So your pet isn't in there with the tank? You leave your cat or whatever at your side to look pretty? If so, OK, my pet will take more damage. It will also do some damage and contribute. If your pet is in there, it will also take some damage. My pet will not take aggro if the tank gets incapacitated. If the tank does, the mob is more likely to go after me or the healer or a rogue or anyone other than my pet. Its damage is decent, but growl is OFF and it does not do enough damage to be highest threat, or second highest threat, or third highest threat. In fact, it is more than likely at the bottom of the threat meter.

Kompera: I beat you to it, but you explained it better than I did. Hats off to you.

Lastly, I want to re-iterate something I said earlier: all specs have their merits. I look at the other two trees and I'm sad that I'm missing abilities in them, but I like BM and I don't see much need to change (although better traps and expose weakness sound very appealing). To Stormofnova: Play the spec you want to play and what you're good at. I agree that BM as a spec, all other things being equal, will probably do more damage. But not if you're better at MM or survival. I don't think any spec will be blatantly turned down because of the spec. I did a Kara run with two BMs and a survival, and although I think it would be more useful to have one of each spec, they were willing to take all three of us. Hell, some of them didn't even know my spec until I got into the raid. I think it's more important to know the people and impress them before the raid than to rely on your spec. In my case, I had grouped with them in various instances and proved that I know how to play my class. If you spec BM and get into a raid because of it, but you suck, they won't invite you back. Play what you enjoy and what you're good at. I know I wouldn't turn someone down because of their spec.

Kompera:

You are blatantly misreading and misinterpreting what I am writing, why, I don't know. I am talking about a process, not patches or perfection, please read my comments IN CONTEXT and stop adding more to them. Blizzard is NOT perfect and I never said they were, but what I have said is that they DO test things and do catch the awful stuff, occasionally mistakes slip through but not in this case of BM vs MM. Any spec having a slight advantage in one area over another spec is NOT a mistake or an error on Blizzards part. It is design and balance, which I think they do a pretty good job of all things considered.
Here are my assumptions about Blizzard, just so we are clear on it: Yes, I assume Blizzard is a professional game development company and has processes in place to test changes before release. Yes, I know that the occasional glitch gets past the development teams and playtesters and that players, being the smart folks they are, can use/abuse talents and skills in ways the developers didn't imagine. I assume those issues and programming errors, graphic errors, calculation errors, minor adjustments to abilities etc are the reason for the patches, not because "Oh my God, Beastmaster spec just rocks! We have to nerf the heck outta that! How did we miss it? Nobody will play anything else! Quick, get the Nerf hammer out!"

The reality is far more simple, they get it close and see what happens. If something gets abused or ends up being more powerful than they thought, they adjust it. Thier "calculators" (to which I assume they have) and "playtesters" (which I assure you they have) only get them close, and WHY only close: because it's friggen THEORYCRAFT and a small group of testers! Reality is that 8 million players determine what works best for themselves (<= my whole point right there) and sometimes find things a small group of playtesters don't. YOu seem to be more intent on arguing my statements than to address my actual point and trying to actually understand what I'm saying instead of interpret it through some strange lens.

Please point out to me where I wrote "BM pets ARE the hunters MAIN source of damage" which you attribute to me. Slammerofkooter wrote that. So before you tell me I'm messed up, you should look to your own flaws. I know what pets do for BM hunters, and while I may not be a hunter god, I can hold my own in a group or solo even as a sucky MM hunter with mostly green gear.

I am a Marksman spec hunter, I don't use my pet well enough to be a Beastmaster spec at this time. Could I learn it, perhaps, but I don't think I'm the best Marksman I can be at the moment so I won't switch over yet to test my skills at it. I have nowhere near the playskills to be a Survival spec hunter and my hat is totally off to those guys that make Survival work well.

Let me know when you want to start addressing the real issues of spec, like which one works best in what kind of instance, raid or against which boss. Strategies for all specs in those situations. What to look for in certain circumstances, perhaps, PvP, how to best solo each spec. Tricks and techniques to make us all better Hunters in whatever spec we chose so maybe we can lose the Huntard reputation.

Let's try to debate things in a positive fashion rather than focus on specific words or our interpretation of what someone is saying.

This mini-max crap is for the birds. Tweak the dial as much as you like, it means nothing if the audience can't hear the difference.

in general, up until the point where all melee takes heavy damage and needs healing, your pet will be fine.
just remember that when melee needs to run out, so does your pet.

the last time i did gruul, we didnt have him on farm yet so i wasnt able to pay a whole lot of attention to my pet, but it stayed alive nearly as long as i did, and i only had to ress it once in 4 tries.
(with the last try being a 1% wipe before we had to call it)
and since my guild is only at Maggy, i cant really say anything about SSC or TK..

Although i havent heard much positive about TK...

As for bosses being poison immune, that's when you grab your Ravager to rip some flesh >:D

Hmm, interesting isn't it?

From the way you talk you would appear to be saying that a player is good or bad depending on pulling aggro. Pulling aggro is just the tip of the iceburg, and sorry, but if you think that is all, you are sadly mistaken.

Across my travels in WoW I have seen BM spec hunters put away their pets for instances, Survival Hunters Melee'ing and entire instance, and when asked why he doesn't do ranged "I don't have a gun".

I have seen all sorts of things that would make an experienced hunter shake his head and cry, but by your measure up there, since they never pulled aggro, they were good players.

Suggestion- Maybe you could pull your head out of your *** so you could see the light?

Heres one thing no one has mentioned (Kompera brushed the subject but didnt elaborate).

In a raid group with a smart raid leader the hunters will be put in certain groups for certain reasons.

BM Hunter: Ferocious Insperation: +3% dmg (To party), because of this a BM hunter will be put in a group with the ELITE of the casters and the BEST shadow priest so the best DPS possible can be gained. Because of this a BM hunter will have the most laid back role in a raid because the BM hunter will not have to worry about mana conservation.

MM Hunter: True Shot Aura: +X AP (To party), since no other ranged class uses AP a MM hunter will not be put with the casters, the only people that can gain from AP are the meleers. So a MM hunter will be placed with rouges/warriors or maybe even the the tanks group, MM hunters will have no chance of a Shadow Priest and since they are with meleers and possibly the tanks group, there will be no heals.

SV Hunyters: Expose Weakness: +X AP (To everyone attacking the target it is laid on). Since SV hunters buff goes across the raid they do not need to be in the party that the meleers that benefit from it are in. So SV hunters can be put anywhere, but a smart raid leader should put the SV hunter with the rest of the casters and may even have a shadow priest.

Apology accepted.

And for myself, I really respect your opinions Kompera. I wish we'd all stop worrying about the little differences and realize the full potential of all specs and where they work best and how they work best. Even have a sticky for it... of course, nobody seems to read stickies anyway... <sigh>

We've seen the perspective guides before, but nothing always updated and nothing sticky here in the forum. Hunters should have the best info. Get some masters of each spec to edit the thread, and we can all input what we've tried and what worked, and what didn't in follow up threads. Keep the master threads clean. Add stuff as new info and experience become available.

Good idea? Bad idea? Impossible idea? I don't know, it would be nice though.

I dunno how a guild could "depend" on a hunter being MM, but if you are topping BM and SV hunters then they just suck be it their gear or their skill. You know I like ya but that's the truth.

and I'm still wearin leather too!! :P (I know you always loved that)

In an attempt to **** of at least one person here...I'm just gonna say this...after playing all 3 specs...I'm just gonna have to say...HYBRID!!! FTW!!! How long until I'm endlessly criticized for my opinion, and someone chimes in and says their opinion is the all powerful will of the WoW hunter gods...regardless of anyones spec preferance, or what statistics say about which spec "should" put out more dps collectively, I'd still have to agree with whoever the above poster was that said it comes down to the player, and what works best for them. I'd say it really depends on who you're fighting as well. If it's a melee critical boss, I'd say a SV hunter who knows what he's doing is better to have than a BM...on the other hand, it's a mostly distance fight with as little melee as possible due to stresses on healing and other factors (Maiden comes to mind here), MM is gonna be nice...I don't care what spec you are, it sucks either way if you get holy fire. Each spec tree brings in certain talents that are beneficial. I can't tell ya how much I love having effiency in long stinkin fights. Less reliance on mana pots, and if there are a lot of casters that need mana more than me, I don't always have to be in the group with the shadow priest. I must say this, no matter what group I've ever been in, if you have a competent hunter, regardless of his spec...this whole healing this is retarded...no matter what spec you are, you should require little to no healing. The only healing that should be required is say, Moroes garrote, Maiden's holy fire, being the "charge sponge" for Attumen...etc etc...basically, the "unavoidable" damage. Look at the "healing received" part of the dmg meters...I always do, and hunters (including myself) are very close to last, if not all the way last. I'm really sick of typing, so I'm just gonna cut it off here...but feel free to criticize this however you want. I think I might have gone over my 2 cents here, I apologize for that. I may have even wandered off topic...beats me. Anyways...have a nice day.

Edit: I just looked at my sig thing, that stuff is outta date. Just some FYI.

Edited, Sep 5th 2007 7:52pm by Durfus