<The WotLK FAQ> - ALL QUESTIONS ANSWERED HERE.Follow

Welcome to the Wrath of the Lich King Hunter FAQ.
click the link above to go to the wiki version.

Keeping the FAQ up to date:
If you notice anything outdated, please PM me or post it in this thread (preferably with corrected text).
It's a good bit of text so there's probably a couple places where it's not correct anymore and without help it's likely to stay that way.
With your help we can keep the sticky up to date and correct.

Index:

Preface/Overview

General questions

• What is a hunter good for?
• Are hunters fun?
• Do hunters suck at PvP? What is the dead zone? How do I jump shot?
• How do I beat a...?
• What's the best race?
• When do I get...?
• What is the hunter's role in a group?
• Why do hunters cost so much / use so much room in their bags?
• What are good trade skills for a hunter?
• Are hunters the best soloists?
• What is pulling and how do I do it?
• Can I play a melee hunter? Where does melee fit in with playing the class?
• What is chain-trapping?
• Why do people say hunters suck?
• Where are some other useful sources of info for hunters?

Explanation of hunter skills

• Aspects
• Traps
• Melee skills
• Tracking
• Stings
• Other shots
• Range-related skills
• Other skills
• And one more…

Pet related questions

• What’s the best pet
• What's your favorite pet?; What is your pet?
• How are pets different?
• How do I get my pet?
• Ok, I have to tame my pets, how do I actually do it?
• Can I only tame beasts?; Why can't I tame a dragon?
• OK, I've decided what kind of pet I want. Where do I find a XXX my level?
• What is happiness?; How do I feed my pet?
• Do pets gain experience and level?; What determines a pet's size?
• Which skills can pets use?
• Oh noes! My pet disappeared/died! Is he gone?
• How do I feed my pet?
• How do I control my pet?
• My pet isn't holding aggro...
• Can I have more than one pet?
• What else can I do with my pet?
• How do I use my pet in an instance?
• Why can't I tame a mount?
• What's so different about exotic pets?
• Pet Talents
• general
• Ferocity
• Cunning
• Tenacity

Talents and Glyphs

• Wut is teh best talnts?
• Where can I find what all the hunter talents are?
• What’s the best hunter tree?
• Which one does the most damage?
• Doesn't an LR build outdamage TSA? It should only take 50 more agi to be better than 100 AP!
• What are the best talent builds?
• BM
• MM
• SV
• What are some good talent builds?
• Why should I use a cookie cutter spec?
• What build should I use while leveling?
• Hunter Glyphs
• Major Glyphs
• Minor Glyphs

Gear and Stats

• What is a hunter weapon?
• Should I use bows or guns?
• What about crossbows?
• Which is better - a 2-hand weapon or dual wield?
• What's the best weapon?
• Where do I learn to use <some weapon type>?
• What are the most important attributes for hunters?
• How does attack power, chance to crit, and chance to hit work?; What is DPS?
• What do these stats give me?
• Where do I view my critical rate?
• What are the best enchants for a hunter?; Why are there no ranged weapon enchants?
• Why does weapon speed matter?; What is a rotation?
• What about other slots besides ranged weapon?
• I'm level X and I have Y agility. Is my gear any good?
• Which gear should I use?

Hunters in Arena

• What do I bring to my team?
• How should I spec for arena?
• And what about gear?
• Do I need to keybind?
• And what about my User Interface?
• Tips

Credits and additional stuff

• My question isn't answered here!
• Credits

Edited, Jan 6th 2010 11:40am by Aethien

GENERAL QUESTIONS


What is a hunter good for?

Hunters are the ranged combat class in WoW. Since they don't (really) have magic, they have some limited combat abilities for if something does get in their face. They also have beast pets whose primary purpose is to allow them to use ranged combat while soloing.

After level 40, they wear stronger armor than any classes other that warriors or paladins, (but they can not use shields like shamans,) plus other defensive abilities such as a high dodge rate. They can also use all weapons other than maces or wands. Hunters are excellent soloists and arguably the best pullers in the game. Unfortunately neither of these skills come into play much during most groups.


Are hunters fun?

Yes, hunters are fun. Any class in the game is fun or not fun, depending on who you ask. I personally despise playing warlocks and druids, but other people think they're the best classes in the game.

Hunters are not an in-your-face class like a rogue or warrior. They aren't a powerful healer or AE damage dealer that has a concrete role in a group. But they are fun for being what they are. If the concept of a hunter sounds appealing to you, you will probably have fun playing one.


Do hunters suck at PvP?
What is the dead zone?
How do I jump shot?

Yes and no. The bottom line is that every class has it's strengths and weaknesses. A hunter, on average, can beat some classes easily, like rogues, and have a lot of trouble with others, like druids.

In battlegrounds, hunters can often have very interesting roles, particularly defensively such as guarding the flag in Warsong Gulch or a node in Arathi Basin. Between tracking to see your opponents coming, and being able to put freezing and frost traps down to stop aggressors, hunters make good guardians.

Check here for more detailed info on hunters in Arena.

The "jump shot" allows a hunters to deal limited damage while outrunning their opponents by jumping, turning 90 degrees shooting an instant shot and turning back. Performing a true jump shot is a complicated mess of pushing buttons on your mouse and keyboard in well-coordinated fashion, so I’m not going to take three paragraphs to explain how to do one. The easier thing to do is simply strafe, since you run just as fast as strafing, and as long as your target is more in front of than in back of you, you can still hit it.


How do I beat a...?

You'll have to use every trick in the book and think for yourself. There really isn't much anyone can do to magically make you a better player in PvP besides reminding you of what abilities you have.
As the posters at the official boards would say, L2P.


What's the best race?

No race is the single best. They all have advantages. First, let it be said that STARTING STATS DO NOT MATTER. Don't pick a Night Elf over a Dwarf because of the difference in starting agility. A Night Elf with 650 agility would have around 643 as a Dwarf. Big deal.

As far as racial attributes go...
Night Elves can go unseen with Shadowmeld, which is useful to hide from an enemy.
Dwarves can cleanse poisons using Stone Form, and are slightly better at using guns.
Draenei have a Heal over time, and increase their party members chance to hit by 1%.
Tauren have extra HP, and can War Stomp to stun targets in close range to help them get back to range.
Orcs have pets that do increased damage, and a minor damage boost every few minutes.
Trolls have a bonus to using bows, can give themselves a small haste effect every few minutes, and have increased damage against beasts.
Blood Elfs can silence nearby opponents and return mana.

All together racial attributes are not that important as you can see. Not one of those is a real must have, so don't chose a race because of their abilities if you can't stand the looks.



When do I get...?
Pets - level 10
Dual Wield - level 20
Aspect of the Cheetah - level 20
Feign Death - level 30
Mail armor proficiency - level 40
Steady Shot - level 50
Misdirection - level 70
Freezing Arrow - level 80
Shields - never.
Plate armor - never.

Want to know about another skill? Check for yourself at the hunter trainer or on the Hunter Spell List.


What is the hunter's role in a group?

A hunter's primary role in a group is to safely deal damage. They have other possible roles, but 90% of the time, your group will want you to just stand in the back and shoot.
Note that that means not taking aggro, running into other creatures to get a clear shot, or breaking sheep. (or any other forms of crowd control)

Other things you can do for your group include:
Crowd Control - Freezing Trap will work on nearly every creature in the game. It affects the first target to run across it, and it doesn't work extremely long when the effect isn't broken by someone hitting the frozen target, freeze trap is still a very powerful tool. While survival hunters are masters of crowd control (due to talents like Wyvern Sting, Readiness and improved traps,) all other specs are still very able to do pull their weight. Also, your pet can sometimes off-tank things in a pinch; at higher levels, this isn't usually recommended, as Fido will not weather too many hits from elites, but better your kitty than your healer!
Pull - Hunters can feign death, take one creature out of the fight with freeze trap, designate a target with Hunter's Mark, and are masters of taking and dropping hate. At level 70 you will also get Misdirection, which lets you give someone the threat from your next 3 attacks. (Note that you cant abort the pull with FD if you do this.)
Scout - hunters can track, meaning they can know if something is nearby without walking up to see it. Hunters can also use their pet with Eyes of the Beast to go exploring; even if the pet aggroes something, as long as he doesn’t bring it back to the party, it doesn’t matter.
Tank - it's a pretty sad day when this happens in a group, but in some cases and with the right talents, your pet can tank single targets. (This is generally a much more acceptable thing to do before level 50 than after.)


Why do hunters cost so much / use so much room in their bags?

In reality, hunters don’t cost more than other classes, but it sure seems that way after buying ammunition and pet food, plus all their other necessities. The costs of these things add up, but other classes have expenses too. Reagents, armor repairs, food/drink, poisons, etc. Do they compare to buying a stack of food and perhaps a full quiver/pouch of specialty ammo? I dunno, ask a level 80 warrior...and remember you don’t need crafted ammo.

The real kicker is that hunters can typically pick up less stuff before they return to town because of the quiver. There's really little that can be done about this. Take trade skills that don't involve gathering 10 different stacks of herbs or generating more leather than you can pick up if this is an issue for you. However, there are plenty of examples of how other classes face this problem as well...just not from level 1.


What are good trade skills for a hunter?

This, like almost anything else in WoW, depends on what you want to do.
Do you want to raid and go for the best possible stats? Then Jewelcrafting + Blacksmithing is your choice.
Do you want to raid and be as self sufficient as you can? A combination of leatherworking, enchanting and Alchemy will be great.
Are you leveling, or just using your hunter to farm? Skinning + Mining or herbalism will be great.
Are you PvPing? then you might want to consider grabbing engineering for the extra tricks it has (even if half of em are nerfed in arena)

The standard is to have two gathering professions while leveling and two crafting professions for endgame.
This because the stat bonuses that crafting professions give are superior to gathering professions and thus will give you more dps.

Note that First Aid, Fishing, and Cooking are not technically trade skills, and do not count against your limit of two. All hunters should do First Aid. Fishing and Cooking help feed your pet, but aren't necessary as they can be a huge waste of time.

Check here for more detailed information on tradeskills.


Are hunters the best soloists?

No, but they are very good. They can move from target to target with little downtime, and can track to the next target to find it faster. The misconception of a hunter being able to fight while not taking damage making them be the best soloists is an often-repeated myth. Many other classes can solo as well as a hunter, it always depends on what you are fighting. There are so many different things you can (or cannot) solo, it is impossible to say which class is the strongest.

However, a beast master hunter can level on their own extremely well. While generally not as useful in a group as certain other characters, beast masters are incredible soloists.


What is pulling and how do I do it?

Pulling is the act of taking a creature from where it is to some other place to fight it. Usually that means one person goes off and fetches it to a spot where the rest of the group lies in wait to ambush it.

Hunter pulling is only more effective with a slow methodical process. While technically it's a more improved method of pulling, it isn't always better because it's sometimes like using a sledge hammer to squish an ant -- your shoe would do just fine. Not only does the group need to listen to you, and stay out of harm's way, but you need to carefully lay a trap, scope the scene, bring the group back, blah blah blah. The point is it is often easier for a random warrior with a gun to pull.

If you are asked to pull for a group, it pays to be thinking about your next pull, or even starting it while the group is still fighting. While I seldom get to pull for an instance group, in Molten Core I knew the pulls and would do my best to “chain pull” – bring another target to the group just as the last one dies. That isn’t something any other class can do very well, mostly because of feign death.

At level 70, hunters get an ability called Misdirection that allows them to make shots and have someone else get the threat for it. At this point, the hunter can out-pull the "random warrior with a gun," but it does have a cooldown, so Misdirection is often reserved for big pulls.
Misdirection is also a great tool to help tanks on multi mob pulls get aggro on all mobs.

Or to kill that annoying dps who keeps slacking

Can I play a melee hunter?
Where does melee fit in with playing the class?

Hunters are a ranged-dominant class. If you completely ignore this, that would be like a rogue who wants to tank, because hey - they have skills that let them do it, right?
You can play a melee hunter, but you'll basically just be a weak paladin/enhancement shaman with a pet and you're better off rolling either of those classes. (or a warrior, rogue, feral druid or death knight)

Melee is not something you should be accustomed to doing as a first choice. It's rare that running in and whacking things with an axe is the ideal strategy for you at any given time. You will always do more damage with your ranged. Past level 40 or so, melee can't even compare.

Hunters should be prepared to melee when the circumstances arise, such as when they can't get to ranged during PvP or in close quarters of an instance. Don't neglect your weapon skills completely. But realize that more often than not, you want to do what you can to get back to range, by Wing Clipping, Counterattacking, Trapping, Scatter Shotting, Intimidating, or whatever else you can come up with. Notice how many tools we have to get to range, though? And how many do we have for real melee damage?

Raptor Strike adds damage to a swing, Mongoose Bite is a decent attack but with a cooldown, Counterattack is a defensive move that isn't focused on damage, and Wing Clip doesn't do damage...


What is chain-trapping?

With the ability to use traps in combat, the CC power of a hunter has greatly increased. To chain trap something, set a trap before the fight starts. When the mobs are actually pulled, the trap cooldown should be almost up. So, after the mob is trapped, move to the side and place a new trap and stand behind it. When the trap wears off the mob will hopefully go towards you and get caught in the new trap. You can then set another trap soon afterwards, while the mob is still frozen.

Note that with the proper talents you can extend the trap time to almost completely cover the trap cooldown, which allows you to control a mob for a long time. The first set bonus for Beastlord armor and the level 80 PvP set also reduce the trap cooldown.


Why do people say hunters suck?

There are a lot of little things wrong with every class. For hunters, some are there because the class was the last to get put in the game and many facets of the game weren't designed with hunters in mind. Some are because Blizzard keeps tweaking the formulas and code used on hunter abilities. Some are bugs that have crept into the code and Blizzard hasn't or won't deal with. Some are just whines for other stupid reasons, like getting owned in a duel.

There are some real hunter issues. You can read the official boards if you dare to sift through the muck for them. However, the most important thing is, every class is playable and every class is fun. Don't let all the forum whiners get to you.

The truth is, hunters are one of the most versatile classes in the game, with very good survivability, high damage capability and a decent amount of utility. It's up to you to figure out how to bring all these things to your character, though.


Where are some other useful sources of info for hunters?
Petopia The site for all info on pets.
ElitistJerks The #1 theorycrafting forum, tough stuff.
EJ Theorycrafting Think Tank EJ's hunter FAQ, more or less.
TKAsomething less theorycrafting, more community than EJ and a site purely for hunters!
The official Blizzard hunter boards kind of says it all, Blizzard's hunter boards.
talent calculator also rather obvious, WoWhead talent calc.
Hunter, prepairing to raid! the other sticky around here.
Arena Junkies for those of you who want to PvP!

Edited, Dec 26th 2009 12:55am by Aethien

PET-RELATED QUESTIONS


What's the best pet?

This is always the first question out of anyone's mouth. Really, there's a lot more to know about pets than just "teh best".
At the moment, bears are considered to be the best leveling pet, crabs the best PvP pet and wolves the best Dps pet.
Although especially for leveling there are many other options available.

What's your favorite pet?
What is your pet?

Please don't start another thread on this subject. Honestly, the "favorite pet" threads are getting old and everyone pretty much just the same thing every time. Expect a lot of "cat" answers, a couple "bears", and a few people who try to be original, plus the occasional "I don't like flying pets because they flap in my face," and "I don't like cats because everyone uses a cat."

And I mostly use my wolf. I need it for raids and that's just about all I do on my hunter.


How are pets different?

There are three ways pets can differ.

The first is diet. Most beasts eat meat, or meat and fish. Some eat other things. To check a pet's diet, use the Beast Lore ability on it, or if it's already your pet, mouse over the little happiness icon in your pet window. With talents and glyphs in Wrath, happiness is not as important as it used to be.

The second is their type. There are three types, ferocity, tenacity, and cunning. The general intent seems to be that ferocity is the dps pet, tenacity is the tanking/soloing pets, and cunning pets have nifty tricks. In actual gameplay cunning is very underwhelming. Each type of pet will have a talent tree that you can access here. The talent trees are fairly self explanatory, so I'll leave that as an exercise for the readers.

The third way that pets are different is in a special ability that all pets have. Each pet type (cat/bear/wasp...) will have one special ability. These are what really sets pets apart and makes certain pets better then others. Pet choice actually depends a lot on what is in your raid.

If you don't have a warrior for sunder armor the worm will be your highest dps pet by quite a bit, due to the armor debuff. He does require you to be Full BM though.
If you don't have a warlock who's putting up CoRecklesness or a druid with fairy fire, a wasp will be your highest dps pet, and it doesn't require full BM
A wolf is a solid choice in any situation, a cat works well and most other ferocity pets aren't bad either.
The spirit beast is completely cool, but it won't do competitive dps and is very hard to get.

Aside from the situational use of the worm and wasp all the pets are somewhat close, and as long as they are ferocity are legitimate choices for raiding. So unless you're a min-maxer, choose a pet you think is cool.

All beasts of a certain type and level will be identical. It doesn't matter if you have a polar bear, I have an elite brown bear, and that guy over there has a rotting bear. If they're all level 50, they are all the same.
(except that the guy with the rotting bear should really take better care of his companion )

See Petopia for all you could ever want to know about pets.


How do I get my pet?

The first thing you must do is the class quest in your starting area after level 10. Go to Dolanaar/Kharanos/Bloodhoof/Razor Hill/Azure Watch/Falconwing Square and look for your trainer. He will give you a series of quests to tame particular creatures in the zone. After you have finished, you will then be able to tame your own pet.


Ok, if I have to tame my pets, how do I actually do it?

To tame a pet you first have to find one you like. Go out into the wild, and find a creature that is a "beast", no bigger than a bear, and not above your level, and click "Tame Beast". Your character will stand still while a bar goes by and the beast will run up and start beating you. This represents the creature's resistance to your efforts to tame it.

If you manage to withstand the attacks for 20 seconds without being interrupted, you will tame your target and it will stop attacking you.

You can NOT take any other action while taming or it will fail. Nobody else can interfere by healing you or tanking the beast. You must simply weather the attacks, but there's nothing keeping you from trying to not get hit. Stand as far back as you can and maybe even start with Concussive Shot first. Freezing Traps are wonderful once you have that skill.


Can I only tame beasts?
Why can't I tame a dragon?

Beasts are the only creatures hunters can tame, and only certain types at that. (See the Allakhazam beast family link under bestiary, or use Beast Lore if you aren't sure.) Dragons are considered to be too intelligent to be tamed as a minion. There are some cool exotic pets you can only tame if you are BM.

OK, I've decided what kind of pet I want. Where do I find a XXX my level?
Go to the side panel for Allakhazam, and under Bestiary, click "By Beast Family..." and pick the family type.
Alternatively, check Petopia for one with a skin you like, because pets can never be more than 5 levels below your own once you've tamed them.


What is happiness?
How do I feed my pet?

Happiness is your pet's current disposition. If your pet is happier, he will fight better.

To raise a pet's happiness, you must feed him. After giving the pet a piece of acceptable food, by clicking on the "feed pet" skill and then clicking on the food in your inventory, they will start gaining happiness at a rate of typically 35 per second. This effect lasts for about 10 seconds, and then you will need to feed your pet again. *Do not feed your pet before that, and do not send your pet to attack while he is "digesting" or you will cut short the effect.* (You can also feed your pet by "picking up" the food onto your cursor and clicking on your pet.) You can also increase your pets happiness through some of the talents in the pet trees and via a minor glyph of mend pet.

The icon for their happiness will eventually turn from red to yellow, and then to green, with enough feeding. As your pet gains levels, old food will stop being as effective. If you start seeing your pet gain 17 happiness instead of 35, you need to get higher-level food. Unfortunately, this means at high levels you will be nearly forced into using Talbuk Venison. At lower levels, vendor costs for food aren't bad, random raw meat works for feeding, and cooking is still meaningful. In Wrath with the glyph or a ferocity pet there is really no need to worry about this anymore. It's much nicer.


Do pets gain experience and level?
What determines a pet's size?

Yes. They gain experience for every mob you kill, but not for quests you hand in. Pets need 5% of the experience you need per level.
The pet tab in your character window will show you your pet's experience bar. A pet will not gain experience when it is your level, to keep the pet from outleveling you.

Each level makes your pet an effective level higher, raising stats and increasing their chance to hit and be missed. It also gives the pet a few extra training points and makes them a tiny bit bigger. All pets of a given type and level are the same size. If you tame some huge behemoth, it will shrink as it becomes loyal to you. (Funny and depressing at the same time.)

Pets will always be at most 5 levels behind you. That means if you tame a level 5 pet at 80 he will magically turn 75 right away.
And if you tame a level 15 pet at level 15, run around with it until you are both level 30 and then place it in the stable it will again magically turn to level 75 if you take it out again after you have leveled to 80.


Which skills can pets use?

There are passive and activated abilities.

Passive abilities are just that: passive. They provide a boost to some attribute, like armor, stamina, or fire resist.

Activated abilities are on use abilities that your pet will use. They can be turned to autocast, so that in a certain situation your pet will automatically cast them (usually every time they can) but autocast can be turned off so you can trigger abilities manually.


Oh noes! My pet disappeared/died! Is he gone?

Your pet can disappear for a number of reasons. These include dying, going out of range, being dismissed or abandoned, being stabled, or taking a flight somewhere. In other words, if you don't see your pet, don't panic.

If your pet is not visible, use the Call Pet ability. He will always be somewhere even if he isn't out. If he is dead you will get an error message to that effect. Then Click res pet!

If your pet dies, he is not gone forever. You have an ability to Revive Pet, that costs a ton of mana. Your pet will come back with low health and much lower happiness. (I tend not to be happy about dying either.) Make sure the first thing you do after rezzing your pet is you feed it.

Pets also disappear while you are mounted.


How do I feed my pet?

Use the feed pet ability, and click on a piece of food that your pet will eat. Refer to the diet comments earlier if your pet "doesn't like that type of food." Your pet should then gain the "feed pet" effect and start gaining happiness, which you would see in the combat log. This leads to two important items:
1) Pets gain less happiness if you feed them food much lower in level than they are. A pet gets maximum happiness - 35 per second - only if the food is less than 20 levels below them. It can drop to 17, then 8, and then 0.
2) MAKE FULL USE OF THE FEED PET EFFECT! If your pet is already eating, don't feed him again. This serves NO benefit - not for happiness, not for anything. Also, note that the pet loses the effect if it enters combat, so don't feed it and then send it off to attack something. Indigestion does not make me happy. Getting to chew my food does.


How do I control my pet?

The pet bar that appears when you call your pet has three sets of commands. The three on the left, Attack, Follow, and Stay, are direct orders. Attack sics your pet on your target, follow tells him to come with you, (or back to you rather than attacking,) and stay is for making sure he doesn't move. I recommend you bind the command for pet attack to an easy-to-reach key like the tilde since you'll be hitting it a lot and pressing ctrl-1 sucks.

The three on the right are for putting the pet into different attack modes. On aggressive, your pet will chase after anything non-friendly nearby and initiate combat with it. In defensive, the pet will protect itself or you from attackers, but otherwise do nothing. A passive pet will simply moan as it gets hit and let itself be beaten. You should almost never set your pet to aggressive, and strictly use passive in instances so your pet doesn't run off.

The middle slots start off empty, and are for placing trained abilities. All trained abilities can be set to "autocast" by right-clicking them, which will mean the pet will use them whenever possible. If your pet isn't holding aggro, make sure he's growling. If you don't want your pet to tank, (because you're grouped with a warrior,) turn growl off and bite and claw on. You can also left-click the pet abilities to manually command your pet to use them.


My pet isn't holding aggro...

There are two potential problems.
1) Your pet needs to be growling (and not cowering.) If growl is turned off your pet will not be generating much threat. Remember that if cower is not on your bar it might be turning on all by itself. Yeah, I know. Super annoying, the same goes for Cower and turning on/off.
2) You're simply generating too much hate. Stop spamming your own abilities. There's no reason to be using multishot or stings in solo 90% of the time. Once you hit level 30 use feign death if you do happen to take aggro.

Side note: Survival hunters have a MUCH harder time keeping aggro on the pet. There's not much that can be done about this, and it has to do with growl mechanics.
They'll have to use their CC to keep mobs from reaching them.


Can I have more than one pet?

Yes and no. You can have one at a time, but you don't have to get rid of your current pet forever to get a new one.

In each town, usually in front of the inn, is a "stable master" who has 4 slots you can purchase to store your pets like putting items in a bank. This way, you can board your pet while you go looking for a new pet, or just to have different pets for different situations (like having a DPS pet and a tanking pet.)


What else can I do with my pet?

To put your pet away, Dismiss it. To get rid of it forever, right-click it's portrait and select Abandon. Note the difference in these two! A dismissed pet is simply hidden, an abandoned pet is gone for good.

Also by right-clicking your pet, you can choose to rename it. You can only ever rename it once, so be sure to name it what you want.

There is an ability called Eyes of the Beast that lets you take control of your pet for a minute. During this time you can run your pets wherever. When the duration expires, your pet will try to run back to you, and will despawn if he is now out of range. Eyes of the Beast can be a useful tool for very long-distance pulling, since the aggro transfers to the hunter after the pet is gone.
It can also be used for scouting unfamiliar areas without risking yourself, or your party if you're in one, especially if you have a cat with prowl.


How do I use my pet in an instance?

Carefully.

Pets can easily cause wipes. Pets do not always take the same exact route you do, and might run past things you don't if you were to jump off an edge and the pet takes the long route. They also will attack things and chase runners places you don't want them to go. Keep a tight leash on your pet in an instance. They don't aggro things as easily as you do, but they still can.

Your pet will mainly be used for support damage, but you can also use it as an off-tank to protect the casters in the back from angry adds that run up to them. Be sure not to attack something that is otherwise under control, however at least now pets will break off an attack from something that becomes controlled.


Why can't I tame a mount?

Because Blizzard says so. Taming a beast for combat training and taming it to be used as a riding animal are two different things. Hunters learn how to hunt, so that's what they teach their pets to do.


What's so different about exotic pets?
Well, first off you can only tame them if you have Beast Mastery talented.
That makes them (semi)rare and the spirit beasts are very rare because they are rare spawn to boot.
All in all Exotic pets aren't much different from normal pets.
They aren't better dps, tanking or best for PvP.
They're simply less seen, loud and extra large.

And a note: If you tame an exotic pet and then spec away from Beast Mastery you will not lose your pet.
It will simply be locked in your stable until the day you spec for beast mastery again.
If it is in your stable and you want to abandon the pet, you'll have to either respec or send a ticket to a GM to remove it from your stable.


Pet talents
check them out here.

Some cookie cutter builds:
The Solo Tank. (PvE BM tenacity)
Pin for the Win! (PvP tenacity)
Arachnophobia (PvP cunning)
RAWR (PvE ferocity)

Edited, Dec 26th 2009 12:59am by Aethien

GEAR AND STAT QUESTIONS


What is a hunter weapon?

"Hunter weapon!" is a running joke among players, mostly started by idiotic comments on a site similar to this one called Thottbot. At some point, it became a nominal standard to call any weapon a hunter weapon, just because hunters *can* use anything but maces, and certain hunters have a tendency to roll on anything they can use.

A true hunter weapon is a decent ranged weapon, or a melee weapon that helps a hunter directly increase their ranged damage or their survivability.


Should I use bows or guns?

Dwarfs should favor guns because of their racial bonus. The same for Trolls and bows. Engineers will probably favor guns because they can make their own (improved) ammo. For anyone else, it doesn't matter at all.

At lower levels, guns generally hit a little harder and bows fire a little faster. They have the same store-bought ammunition, and neither really has a distinct advantage over the other, except that engineers can make bullets. A hunter should know how to use either, and be prepared to use whatever the best weapon is that they can pick up, or whatever they personally prefer. (For example, some players don't like the constant noise a gun makes.)


What about crossbows?

Crossbows are exceedingly rare early in the game. They work just like bows - using arrows - but they have their own separate weapon skill. Crossbows as a general rule are very slow. Before patch 1.10 and "normalization" that took away most of the advantage of picking a weapon just because it was slow, crossbows were extremely popular. Before level 50, you might very well never see a crossbow unless you seek them out (with the exception of the Draenei starting lands.)


Which is better - a 2-hand weapon or dual wield?

Use whatever has the best stats, and don't worry too much about damage on the weapons. Since a hunter's strength is fighting at range, they do not need to focus on their melee DPS.

Generally speaking, a 2-hander will have better stats, but a pair of 1H weapons offer greater flexibility. At endgame, there are enchants that can add 110 Attack Power (2H only), 26 agility, 65 attack power and 25 hit rating + 25 crit rating.
This comes out slightly in favor of dual wield.

In terms of actually meleeing, 1handers are better for PvP where you need a weapon chain on one weapon to protect you against disarms.
a 2H will do more damage with a single hit though.

On that note, don't roll against a rogue or a warrior on a melee weapon that purely does damage and has no stats or other factors. You do *not* need a high DPS dagger with a chance on hit to do extra magic damage. This creates a lot of enmity toward hunters from other classes.
And proc melee weapons (a.k.a. chance on hit) do NOT work for hunters, they never have and they never will.

What's the best weapon?

Best in what way? There are countless high end weapons in raids. You can also get epic weapons through Arena PvP at lvl 80 and a few weapons can be obtained through Reputation. The problem is that the “best” weapons only come from endlessly raiding high-end dungeons with a group of 25 people, require being very skilled at PvP-ing or an endless rep grind.

Also, there is no best. It all depends on your talent spec, what you do a lot, and what is obtainable for you.


Where do I learn to use <some weapon type>?

In every major city, somewhere, there is a weapon trainer. Ask a guard where this person is. The weapon trainer for a city only teaches certain weapons, but if he doesn't teach what you want, he can tell you who (in another city) does.


What are the most important attributes for hunters?

Agility (which adds attack power and chance to crit) is number one. No questions asked. That doesn't mean you should switch items because one has a single point of agility more if you are sacrificing other stats, though.

Stamina and Intellect are of some benefit to hunters. Stamina is often preferred, but some hunters argue that a hunter should not get hit, and thus more HP is irrelevant...but more mana lets them fight longer, so they try to get intellect.


Later in level, you will start seeing other qualities on equipment. Agility is good because it increases your Attack Power and your chance to crit. There are items that specifically increase one of those two factors, and are important to your damage output. Mana per 5 seconds (MP5) helps you keep your mana high while shooting and thus keeps you doing damage for a longer time. There are also Hit Rating bonuses that make you less likely to miss.

While usually the last thing hunters look at, defensive attributes like armor and chance to dodge are of some limited benefit. Agility also increases your chance to dodge, as well as your armor.


How does attack power, chance to crit, and chance to hit work?
What is DPS?

Attack Power (AP) and crit chance increase your damage in different ways.

AP increases your basic DPS by 1 DPS per 14 points of AP. Note that DPS stands for damage-per-second, and is a rate, not an amount per hit. So your attack power will scale to give slower weapons the right amount more that they should do. Certain abilities, such as Aimed Shot or Multi-shot, pretend your weapon have a speed of 2.8 so there is no advantage to faster or slower weapons.

Crit chance gives you better odds to get a critical hit. A crit will deal double damage, or if you have the Mortal Shots talent, x2.3 damage. A large number of crits creates "spiky" damage that can steal aggro early in the fight, and hunters that focus on "crit gear" will often have lower basic DPS since they lack attack power, but critical chance is another important way to increase your overall damage output. At level 80, it takes 45.91 points of crit rating to add 1% chance to crit.

Note that agility increases your ranged attack power by 1 per point (and 1 for melee,) and roughly every 83 points of agility increases a hunter's critical rate by 1% at level 80.
This crit rate conversion is specific to hunters, and is the worst of all the classes in the game.

Chance to hit affects your accuracy. Loosely speaking, you have a 95% chance to hit an even-level target. (This is actually based on the difference between your weapon skill and the target's defense skill, so higher level creatures and warriors with lots of +defense will be missed more often.) Hit rating adds to this 95%. It takes about 33 hit rating to add 1% chance to hit.

What do these stats give me?

Note: Some of these numbers change with level. Level 80 is assumed here.
Anything besides attack power scales with level. (crit from agility, crit rating, hit rating etc)

In the early levels it's hard to get AP, so mostly hunters go for agility and stamina. As you progress you will see a larger variety of items, at which point you will have to do more analysis to figure out what's better.

Here are some basic numbers:

1 (Ranged) attack power = 1/14 tooltip DPS

Agility
83.33 Agility = 1% crit
1 Agility = 1 Ranged Attack Power
1 Agility = 1 Melee Attack Power
1 Agility = 2 Armor

Crit/Hit
45.91 Crit Rating = 1% Crit
1% Crit = 1% of your tooltip DPS, or 1.3% with Mortal Shots
32.79 Hit Rating = 1% Hit
Note: To prevent misses you need +5% hit when fighting opponents of your level, and 8% when fighting raid bosses.
Since Draenei give 1% hit to everyone in their group, you'll only need 4% or 8% when grouped with a Draenei.


Intelligence
1 Intelligence = 15 Mana.
1 Intelligence = 0.33 Attack Power for every point in Careful Aim.


For a much more detailed (and complicated) view on what hunter stats do for you check this thread.


Where do I view my critical rate?

On your character screen, select the dropdown for Ranged (or Melee.)


What are the best enchants for a hunter?
Why are there no ranged weapon enchants?

The best enchants are the ones that add to the things mentioned in the "best attributes" question. Increased melee damage and weapon procs like Crusader or Mongoose are not worth the expense, although if you like the orange glow of a Demonslaying enchant on your spear, go for it.

Ask your guild enchanter what he can enchant that would be useful. I wouldn’t advise heavily investing in enchanting before 80, because you will replace your gear every couple levels, but at 80, you might consider greater savagery (+85AP) on weapon, +35 AP on gloves, +16 agi feet and +8 stats chest enchants as a few examples.

Leatherworkers can provide you with enchants on your legs called Leg armor.
There are two different types, 1 focusing on stamina with some Agility the other focusing on Attack Power with some crit rating.

In Outlands and Northrend, some groups have head enchants for sale if you reach a high enough lvl of reputation.
For hunters you can buy a head enchant from the Cenarion Expedition Quartermaster in Zangarmarsh. (Revered reputation required 34 attack power/16hit rating.)
And from the Knights of the Ebon Blade quartermaster at the Shadow Vault in Icecrown (Revered reputation required 50 Attack Power, 20 critical strike rating)

With The Wrath of the Lich king, a new set of shoulder enchants entered the game.
These are available from the Sons of Hodir at honored and Exalted.
The honored version is equal to the Aldor Exalted shoulder enchant. (from the Burning crusade)

There are no ranged weapon enchants. This is where engineering comes in. Scopes can modify ranged weapons to add +damage effects the same way +damage enchants modify melee weapons.
Scopes only affect ranged attacks (just in case those rogues and warriors ask you where to get those nice scopes.)
Check your local engineer to see what he has to offer for your level/gold.

Once you enter Outland you will also find gear with sockets. In those you will want to add gems which contribute to your main stats. Survival hunters will go for agility while beastmasters will mainly go for attack power gems and Marksmen can go either way.
There are also gems that have half of this bonus and half of something else, and count as other colors if you need to match the colors on your item. (That is only to get the socket bonus!)

For more info, check the Gemming part of the pre-raid sticky.


Why does weapon speed matter?
What is a rotation?
Weapon speed used to matter in wow 1.x and 2.x, with the release of Wrath a hunter's special shots no longer interfere with auto shots.

A rotation is simply the order in which you fire your shots.
Or with the changes to mechanics in 3.0 it is more precisely described as the priority you give the shots you want to fire.
It is asking yourself the question of "when these shots are off cooldown, which one should I use?"


What about other slots besides ranged weapon?

Use whatever has the best stats. There is no single simple answer for this. Allakhazam is designed for helping you research items, so just look for items that have agility, attack power, crit rating, and other things that help your performance.

Before you get to Outland, this means mostly looking for random greens that have the stats you want. Afterwards, quest rewards are generally superior and dungeon drops are also very nice.


I'm level X and I have Y agility. Is my gear any good?

If X isn't 80, or 19/29 for a battleground twink, who cares? You're just going to replace it all in the next five levels.

Which gear should I use?
Use the Spreadsheet for lvl 80.
At any earlier level, just use your brain and compare them manually.
For example at level 63 you might have to choose between Fel Iron Greatsword and Silver Edged Axe of the Bandit
Step One is to write the stats the pieces give on paper.
This would be +30 critical strike rating, +62 Attack Power versus +24 Agility, +36 Stamina, +48 Attack Power.
(at this step, add extra's gained through talents such as Careful Aim, Hunter versus Wild and Lightning reflexes)

Step Two is to break things down to the basics:
1 Agility gives about half the crit of 1 crit rating so we will treat the 24 agility as 12 crit rating and 24 AP.
Now it's +30 crit and +62 AP versus +36 stamina, +12 crit and +72 attack power.

Step Three is to leave out all the unnecessary bits:
Since both weapons have (at least) 62 attack power and 12 crit rating we can leave that out of the equation.
So we end up with +18 crit versus 36 stamina and 10 attack power.

Step Four is the conclusion:
Here, it comes down to preference and you will have to ask yourself some questions.
Obviously, 18 critical strike rating will give you more dps than 10 attack power while 10 attack power and 36 stamina represent more raw itemvalue. So you will have to evaluate for yourself whether you have a use for that extra 360 health.

Talents of course affect these kind of equations, but you'll have to figure all that out for yourself.
If you follow the steps I did above you are sure to come out with an obvious answer nearly every time.
And if you don't come up with a clear answer, it's likely that the difference is quite small and thus not very important. (tip: Go with the prettiest piece! )

Edited, Jan 6th 2010 11:33am by Aethien

Great idea on the Help Me thread, a million rate ups for you :) .

What ever happened to the math thread that Az made? Should we start working on one of those too?

Also, I am currently in the process of wikifying this as well. I'll link it when its done.

The wiki is formatted and up now for all to see.

I know. I groaned a bit to myself when I looked at all the changes. I suggest we wait a bit to see if ammo is removed at what that does. Add the new talents, but avoid doing a big change before that.

Moved your wiki link to the main title on the first post so it's easier to see as well.

It's currently stacking to 1000. their intent is to make it an infinite arrow somehow but it won't be in 3.1 Pouches and quivers will still exist but they won't give any haste, and with ammo stacking to 1000 you don't really need 28 slots.

It's not in the FAQ yet because it's not live, we're going to have to do a major update with 3.1, so we're waiting until we actually know what the changes are.

Edited, Mar 12th 2009 9:23am by Xsarus

you can change names more than once now?


Not a good idea if you ask me... Ah well, I'll go change it soon(ish)

This is a fantastic idea. Thanks for volunteering to write it. I look forward to seeing your version so we can critique and edit it. When do you think you'll have it ready?

Edited, Mar 13th 2009 10:45am by Xsarus