Ongoing Upgrades, advise pleaseFollow

Hi All,

Well after some previous threads on what I should be doing with my Hunter and the advice I recieved I have made the following changes:

Changed my Talents to a good old 41\20\0 as per sticky for BM.

I have got a nice new max level and loyalty Black Raptor.

I have maxed out LW and grinded the mats to create, and now wear, Lightning Reflex Shoulders and Netherdrake Helm, I have also purchased some Vindicator Chain Bracers. I have all the Recipes for some Ebon Scale Armour that is going to require some good grinding sessions for mats!!!

I have replaced all my gem slots with Agility and Attack Power, except Meta Gem slot, got to earn some serious Gold for that one!!

Here is the link to my Armoury for you all - http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Aggramar&n=Th%C3%B3romin

So I am now looking for further advice. I know about the crappy enchants on my weapons. I also know the need for me to get better rings and trinkets but that is just a matter of time and gold and getting invites to instances.

The last thing to ask is this. Despite all these changes I am still only blasting out an average 450 shot damage each time and the crit never exceeds 2500 so far with my gun. Melee I seem to hit around 350 all the time and crit no more than 950. How can I get this up further???

Your help, guys and girls, as always is much appreciated.



Edited, Aug 12th 2008 9:33pm by Thoromin

Yes I am using a macro that runs as follows:

/script UIErrorsFrame:Hide()
/castsequence reset=2 !Auto Shot, Steady Shot, Arcane Shot, !Auto Shot, Steady Shot
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()
/script UIErrorsFrame:Show()

Using the question mark icon to bring up each shot image so I am not relying to heavily on just a cast bar for steady shot timing. I sometimes wonder if the Arcane shot is worth it. My pet holds aggro well so I have plenty of time to down a mob, but my damage per shot is just not good enough for raids and I dont want to be letting anyone down.

Thanks in advance for any macro changes you can give me.

damage/shot isn't what a hunter is about. We aren't going to have the HUGE OMFGWTFPWNZERS numbers like a mage or destro lock. But we are going to continually pump out a nice steady DPS for a long long time.

What are you planning on doing with your hunter? Raid or PvP? If you are wanting to raid, get that hit up to 142.

Go work on your Cenarion Expedition rep and get the head enchant from them.

Up to you how you want to play and what makes it easier for you. Macro's in general combine buttons or extra clicks that normally you wouldn't have to use. A shot-rotation macro in a BG isn't always helpful, mostly due to the fact that you don't stand in one spot for more then 5 seconds at best (unless of course the enemy doesn't see you behind the hedge). However a melee macro might work in your favor when you're caught by the rogues, warriors, enhancement shamans and feral druids.

The point of a Macro is to have 1 button for various skills/talents. There are limitations of course, but it helps reduce the amount of junk on your toolbars. Clicking is pretty much how everyone starts out. It's hard to get away from, but once you do, you'll find that using macro's and hotkeys are a lot faster and typically more efficient then clicking the keys themselves. Mouse-Over Macro's are great for healing and decursing/dispelling. Focus macro's are awesome for setting a target up to be your "Focus" and then you never have to target them again even if you want to shoot them with say a viper sting, or use a sheep spell on them, or whatever the case may be.

Another thing that would help you are Keybindings. The general WoW Keybindings are there, but many UI also offer other types of keybindings you can use. For example, when you hit Z in the game, your character will unsheathe their weapons and display them out in front of them. I've personally changed my Z to make my pet auto-attack. I find it works much easier for me. I've also set the scroll wheel on my mouse to do various things. If you scroll the wheel up, it uses my 1st Shot-Rotation macro, if you scroll the wheel down it uses my 2nd Shot-Rotation macro, and if I just click the wheel like a normal mouse click, it sends in my pet as well.

I'm still messing with setting up keybindings and macros just the way I want them, but just in my own experimentation I've found it to be much faster, and much more efficient to use macros. If for nothing else, they make your life lazier, and prolong the time before you get carpal tunnel syndrome.

Back on topic:


Kelnoen is absolutely right in this case. Your speed is 1.9 with your current gear and bow, and using the /castsequence macro with the arcane is more or less hindering your DPS.

The typical macro that he displayed is better for your spec and your speed. A typical /castsequence macro is better for those with low latency, good FPS, and if you plan to use Arcane Shot, a lower attack speed (2.1 or higher typically). You have to remember that the auto-shot itself has a basic .5 delay to it. The 1:1 or 3:2 ratio are ideal for this, and the macro itself scales depending on your attack speed. 1.9 is awesome for a 1:1 especially, anything higher would more then likely result in a 3:2 or even a 2:1.


As said before, NEVER worry about melee. What you're looking at is your average shot damage, not your average DPS, BIG difference between the two.

Example:
Hunter #1
Average Shot Damage - 450
Average Shot Time - 2.5 Speed
DPS = 180

Hunter #2
Average Shot Damage - 450
Average Shot Time - 1.9 speed
DPS = 236.8 (roughly)

Because of your attack speed, you've gained a little over 56 more DPS then the previous hunter. Being a BM hunter, it's not about big numbers, it's about speed. Later on, with better gear upgrades your average shot damage will increase, as will your DPS. However you still have a long way to go. Your haste is pretty much where you want it right now, but later on you will receive items with Armor Penetration which is by far one of the best stats for any physical damage DPSer right now. You'll have to decide on a medium point between agility/ap/crit and armor pen.

Your current Gun also doesn't have a lot of base damage right now. 139-259 isn't a whole heck of a lot of base damage. It's upped by your AP of course, talents, etc. but that's the reason why your auto-shots are only doing 450 on average. If you check out my armory, I'm only doing roughly 600-700 on average per shot. A fully sundered mob, I can do up to 1K+ (normal not crit). Also as Zebug said, you won't ever see the same numbers as a Destro Lock or a Mage. There's just no way possible for us to hit a 10K auto-shot, aimed, multi, or arcane shot right now (unless you're fighting Curator, but even then it's still pretty tough). However due to our speed and accuracy, we are one of the best single target DPSer's in the game as of now. AE is obviously taken by Warlocks and Mages (depending on the situation of course, typically mages out-DPS warlocks but not always).

Hit should always come first if you plan to do any type of raiding. 5% is the min required for PVP situations, but for PVE you want a total of 9% or 142 like Zebug said. Typical grinding and questing I really wouldn't worry about hit, as it's not that big of an issue. 5-Man instances also aren't that bad, but remember that if you can't hit your target, you aren't dealing any damage either. So your DPS will go down.

Biggest suggestion? Get into some heroics and start saving your badges for the badge gear upgrades. The chest piece, legs, and the bow would be huge upgrades for you at this point. Not to mention the ring. Also check out the sticky for Aethien's Pre-Raid Gear guide, very helpful for up and coming hunters.

*Edit*
Season 2 Gear isn't half bad either for some upgrades (if you're willing to grind BG's).

Edited, Aug 13th 2008 10:36am by Joobishwun

Kelnoen:

Your 1:1 and 3:2 macros are identical... ^_^