Specs, Specs, Specs
“I was wondering if you used two different builds for the rush from 60-70, one that was feasible for speedy level gaining and one for raiding. Many Thanks, Stillwater.”
For grinding, it’s hard to find fault with the Beastmaster spec. Yes, you can level as a Marksman easily enough and if that’s your preferred method, more power to you. Grinding as a Survivalist is tough; one crits so often that mobs are pulled off your pet.
For raiding, it’s a different story. First off, personal preference is always encouraged at BRK the Blog. Playing a spec you don’t like is pretty painful and having fun is the name of the game.
That said, inter-raid dynamics is important. If you’re running Karazhan with two hunters and the raid leader is going to put you both in the same party, don’t have the same specs. Any mix of BM/SV/MM is better than two of the same. If you know your hunter-partner, work out which specs you wish to play. If he insists on BM, you might try SV. If he insists on MM, you might want BM. And remember that only one of you needs Improved Hunter’s Mark, so the other gets Efficiency.
Now if you’re the only hunter in the raid, you might want to consider the raid makeup to maximize your helpfulness. If you’re going to be in a party with two rogues and a dual-wielding shaman, and your agility is high enough, Expose Weakness and the SV tree is going to be tremendous. If you’re party will consist of a shadow priest, a boomkin, and a mage, Ferocious Inspiration and the BM tree will provide better party bonus-damage.
There are other considerations, such as are you going to be asked to Chain Trap every dang pull, or does the raid need Silencing Shot for caster pulls because your raid doesn’t have a priest who can Silence, (whatever the spell is named).
Adapting your spec to the needs of the raid earns you solid BRK Cool Points.
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15 Responses to “Specs, Specs, Specs”
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Just wanted to note that Ferocious Insperation stacks with multiple hunters. I was in a raid group with 3 BM hunters once and I was getting 9% increased damage. I love it!
“Playing a spec you don’t like is pretty painful and having fun is the name of the game.”
You’d never make it for 5 seconds as a Paladin with that attitude. Get in the back and heal you sissy! :O
haha, seriously though, I try to have that outlook with all classes, and I encourage everyone to play the way they like first and foremost as long as it won’t directly impact your team. IE. If they need a tank badly, be selfless and spec to be a tank to help the guild out.
Blizzard should just allow u to swtich between 2 specs with no cost, then everyone would be happy.
to the above comment…that is absolutely ridiculous because then there would be hardly a difference between two of the same class. enough on that.
i miss big red trapper…
doom
ps - its 97 degrees outside, 100% humidity…and our office ac is busted…
Hmmm… is BRK’s current specs recommended for a newbie to BM hunting then?
Our current spec is more of a raiding-BM spec than grinding. If you’re primarly grinding, then you’ll want the extra armor instead of Improved Aspect of the Hawk. We took IAotH because we’re going to Kara (suppossedly) for the next three nights and want all the DPS we can bring.
Brk, do you have dibs on the next crossbow or gun that drops in Kara? mmmm 79 dps.
hunters have it pretty good in Kara early on. most guilds kill attumen on the first night and immediatly get him on farm status. and he drops some nice hunter loots each week. weve been going for just 3 weeks now and one hunter got the bracers and the other the crossbow already.
Thanks BRK!
I take it that Pet/Hunter DPS and survivability of pet should take precedence in levelling?
Anyway, thank you for responding to the most important point of my email. I appreciate the feedback.
Is it possible to run a 5 man instance with 5 Hunters or 4 Hunters and a healer?
4 or 5 Tanks gargantuan amounts of DPS. Ok not so good when the Phat Loot drops.
I think it sounds like a hoot.
Me and another BM ran regular Blood Furnace and smoked it no problem. Pet tanks with some traps made it a breeze to do. It was also a heck of alot of fun.
we had 5 hunters in our guild that did a ramparts run and were fine, even with out a healer. They wanted to see if they could do it and turns out they did fairly well. dont think i heard too much of them wiping.
As far as respecing for the raid, i do aggree. My main is a lock and i wasnt forced but was asked to respec affliction, I did and i hate it only because i dont have the gear to support it. I miss the instant nuke of my previous build but because i respec’d we down the prince our first time seeing him because of all my dots i put up. in the end it was me and a mage left alive!
Hunters are already capable of soloing an amazing amount of 5-man content with clever kiting. Any encounter that doesn’t feature unavoidable damage (I.E., a healer endurance fight) could probably be wrapped up rather easily with 5 hunters who could set up a pet tank/freezing trap/feign death rotation.
A BM with a defensive pet would make a great main tank.
Imagine never wiping, ever; 5x Feign Death for the win!
I know three Pallies, a Priest with Spell Steal (+500 Spell Damage FTW), and any random DPS can mop up Botanica in 60-90 minutes. That’s how our GM, who’s been absent recently due to dial-up, is farming his tanking shoulders.
Priests have “Spell Steal”?
good write up…
“Playing a spec you don’t like is pretty painful and having fun is the name of the game.”
hell yes!
I played Beastmaster to about lvl 50 because that’s what everyone said was “best” for leveling… but I wasn’t having fun with it… auto shoot and watching the cat go just didn’t appeal to me…so, eventhough it was a slower grind to 70, I went MM and love it… with 4 warriors and 2 feral druids, and a rogue among the 10 lvl70s in our little guild… MM with trueshot and silencing is much more appreciated than another off-tank..
I even asked the guild leader and officers if they wanted me to swap to SV or BM for raiding, and they had a resounding NO! my current spec is 0/49/12 and I’m usually top 1-2 of the dps charts in our instance runs and have more fun than ever…
btw, your tips on chain trapping and macros have really helped me out! even guildies have noticed!