“Dear BRK, sorry to add to your flood of email, but I was wondering if you could help clarify the value of weapon skill for a hunter.

“I’m a dwarf hunter so I get +5 to my skill with guns. I’m trying to determine how much of a benefit that is relative to bows/crossbows. This has become relevant due to a very lucky week in Karazhan, in which I got the [Wolfslayer Sniper Rifle] and promptly blew about 200g on a Stabilized eternium scope for it. Then I proceeded to get the [Sunfury Bow of the Phoenix] the following night (please don’t hate me).

“My question is whether to get a scope for the bow, or keep using the gun. The bow clearly has a higher damage output, but I’m wondering if the +5 to guns offsets the difference or outstrips it.

“I have read mixed reports, but +5 weapon skill rating seems to increase crit rate by .5% and have smaller boosts to hit rating. It’s unclear to me if this applies to ranged weapons or just melee. It seems like +.5% crit might be worth more than the stat difference on the weapons, but I’m not sure about that either. Can you provide any insights, or are the differences too small to worry about? Thanks, Geoffrey”

Weapon Skill is a modifier that uses your enemy’s defense rating to calculate how extra-deadly you are. One weapon skill point gives +0.04% Crit, +0.04% Hit, (and your opponent’s chance to block, dodge or parry decreases by 0.04%), for every point you have more than your opponent’s Defense Skill.

You’re a 70 Night Elf hunter using a gun. You have a 350 gun skill rating. You’re fighting a 70 Troll hunter who is using a bow. You both have 350 defense ratings.

As the NE hunter, your 350 gun rating matches the troll’s 350 defense rating, so your weapon skill gives you no bonuses.

The Troll hunter, however, has a +5 bow skill as a racial ability. Therefore his 355 bow skill rating gives him +0.04% Crit and +0.04% Hit for every point he has more than your 350 defense skill. Since his bow rating is five points higher than your defense rating, all those bonuses are multiplied by five. The Troll hunter gets 0.2% Crit and 0.2% Hit against you because of the troll’s racial bonus to bows.

Now this all changes a bit against mobs higher than your level. The 2.0.1 patch has notes about weapon skill that say, against mobs above their level, players gain +0.1% Crit, not 0.04%. If the 73 elite you’re fighting has a 350 defense and you have a 355 skill rating on your gun, you get +0.5% crit, and that’s d@mn spiffy.

Now if you really want to get jiggy with it, you have to start worrying about glancing blows and the crit-cap and other esoteric nonsense that we don’t really worry too much about on this site.

But it should be pointed out that Weapon Skill Rating is different than Weapon Skill. At level 70, it takes 3.9 points of Weapon Skill Rating to increase your actual Weapon Skill by 1. A piece of gear that increases your WSR by 16 is not increasing your WS by 16, but only by 4.1.

But our reader’s question is: does his racial bonus to guns make the gun a better weapon for him than the bow? Pfft, h3ll no; not in this case. If the comparisons were between the Wolfslayer and the [Steelhawk Crossbow], then we’d say the racial bonus was a deciding factor. But the Sunfury is a Big Upgrade; it’s a level 125 weapon, not a 115. Take your Sunfury and get another 200g scope. Such is the price for phat loot.

Pepi, aka Trigity, aka Tiggy, is trying to formulate a plan to make off with the BRK puppy, a 100lb yellow Labrador who lives to swim. Tiggy is enchanted with the big lap-dog and wants to take him home. We will thwart her, oh yes we will.