Why mail at level 40?Follow

This is not meant to be a silly question but I'm wondering why hunters are allowed to get mail armor at level 40. I have an alt hunter, BM spec, that is now level 38. Soloing/leveling is very easy, even when I have to engage more than one mob. So why the mail, and why at level 40 (as opposed to level 1)? I have NOT run any instances with my hunter nor have I done any PvP so I'm certainly far from being an expert at the class. I assume there is something about the class or a particular build that would justify mail, but I don't see it yet. All flames should be sent to /dev/null :)

Even after lvl 40 leather may have better stats/bonus. Look for the bonus not just armor rating only.

It's probably just me but I have trouble finding decent "Hunter" mail armor below 70.

Edited, Jul 9th 2008 10:20am by Nobic

Well all the armor "upgrades" come at level 40. Paladin and Warrior get plate at 40. Shaman and Hunter get mail at 40. 40 was a turning point in the leveling(back when 60 was the max). 1-20 cake, simple and over in a blink of an eye. 20-40 is a little bit tougher, but you can still remain pretyt close to your homelands. 40 is about the time you travel to the far reaches of the world. Hinterlands, Feralas, Azshara, in my eyes it keeps along with the RPG portion of the game in that at 40 you venture farther from home and need stronger armor to survive the wilds.

Aside from the classes competing for armor, there is another fundamental about hunters that makes them seem more likely to need mail over the other DPS/CC classes. That is the functionality of their traps. Because the Hunters traps require the hunter to pull aggro and get the mob chasing you, you are more likely to be hit than any other DPS/CC class there.

In other words, all other forms of CC are just applied, if those CC classes pull aggro and get attacked, then it was a matter of poor hate management. Hunters are required to pull aggro, and are more likely to get hit. Sure they shouldn't get hit and it is poor trapping if you are hit, but $^!^ happens and sometimes you get hit. Suffice it to say, the risk of getting hit is higher as a hunter because you need aggro to trap.

Of course at the end of all, the difference between mail and leather doesn't amount to a hill of beans, one or two hits and your dead at end game either way. But the decission of mail and leather was made way way back in the days when 60 was the max and I'm thinking that it was a bit different back then.

But I'm just talking out of my butt lol. PS. Hey folks who remember me, I'm back. :-P

I'm sorry, when I think, my default frame of mind goes to heroics and raids, and well if you use your pet to get aggro in order to trap, your pet dies, which kills group DPS, which could kill the group/raid. So you don't want your pet to really do anything besides beat on the same mob the MT is tanking.

So, your right as well, in the lower instances, where our pets can survive a decent beating, you can use your pet to get aggro in order to trap(hell you can use your pet to off tank too). The only problem with that is chain trapping, where if your pet has hate on a trapped mob and when it unfreezes it heads for your pet, you just have to do a little more trap placement planning than usual, but it's possible.

Pre-TBC Hunters were the only Alliance class that could wear mail. That would be a lot of wasted drops 40+ if Ally had noone capable of wearing it. Horde would still have had Shamans at least.

I would imagine that had a little bit to do with the decision.


Edited, Sep 15th 2008 6:25pm by Ikaridono

Kind of a rate down for necro-posting a tangent on a month old thread.

WTF?

Actually, hunter pets did not scale with armor until fairly recently, so mail being designed to buff pets isn't true.