That’s No Lock, That’s An Outlet
“Dear BRK, I read your post about you owning that ‘lock. You blewbies don’t know the first thing about pvp. Try levelling and playing on a pvp server. That is the real challenge. Owning a n00b ‘lock shouldn’t be thing you toot your own horn about. Tackling a lethal geared lock with 12k hps or a warrior in full gladiator gear should be something worthy of a brag.
“I think you guys should stick to cross-teaming and loot-whoring. Leave the pvp to us real men! - name withheld by BRK because public personal attacks aren’t our bag - 70 troll hunter, Crushridge.”
Thank you for that inspiring debate. Call us back when you have a scope on your ranged weapon and more than 1/3 of our honor kills and we’ll talk. We blewbies want to learn about PvP.
(A big BRK Thanks to the BRK Executive Assistant for the emergency armory research.)
“Dear BRK, are there any resources out there for finding out how to spec my pet for each instance? I remember you talking about need lots of Arcane and Shadow resistance going through ShadowLabs, and maybe a few other instances, but what about the rest? Boomsville and Kablamo.”
+5 BRK Cool Points for the names. If we had more stable slots we’d definitely train a Kablamo.
Boomer, you bet there are resources for finding out what resistances to give your pet for instances! You know it! Thanks for the letter.
“Dear BRK, I’m only level 38 … but have been really been re-thinking the fact that i don’t have Animal Handler. I spent one point in Bestial Swiftness because I do a lot of outdoor questing and capped out Frenzy. Was that stupid? Should I drop Bestial Swiftness and put 4/5 in Frenzy in order to get Animal Handler or is [it] OK that I don’t have Animal Handler? Kestrus and Revelin.”
It’s totally OK not to have Animal Handler at your level. Bestial Swiftness is fabulous for grinding and leveling and we recommend it heartily until you start running instances regularly. Going 5/5 in Frenzy is great for leveling, too. You want it to proc as quickly as possible because you’re going to be in short fights, not eight, nine, or ten minute marathons.
“Dear BRK, you didn’t really answer that question about pet specs. You totally avoided it, literally interpreting his email. But you’re not being very helpful are you, you loud-mouthed schnook? BRK and Hobbes.”
You’re right as usual, BRK. Totally on the ball with that question, you nailed it. Damn you’re good.
OK, specing your pet for resistances. Let’s see if we can do this from memory, shall we?
Hellfire Citadel
Ramparts - Fire and Shadow
Blood Furnace - Fire, Shadow and if you have the points, Nature
Shattered Halls - Fire and Shadow
Coilfang Resevoir
Slave Pens - Fire, Frost, and if you have the points, Nature
Underbog - Nature
Steamvaults - Nature
Auchindoun
Mana Tombs - Shadow, Fire, Arcane, and Frost
Auchenai Crypts - Shadow and Fire
Sethekk Halls - Arcane
Shadow Labyrinth - Shadow, Fire, and Nature
Tempest Keep
Mechanar - Fire and Arcane
Botanica - Fire and Arcane
Arcatraz - Shadow and Fire
Raids
Karazhan - Arcane, Fire, and Shadow
Gruul’s Lair - grab ankles and just hold on; we’re still learnin’ this one
“Dear BRK, am I doing something wrong?! I do what you say, I’m 41/20 BM. I have a kill command/steady shot macro. I spam that like h3ll and then occasionally arcane or multi depending on the situation. I can chain trap and I can manage my aggro. All in all I am a pretty good hunter, I think. But I do not top damage charts. I only run 5 man instances and am almost always 2nd or 3rd in DPS. Mages, rogues, locks they all out dps me. Ruzgob.”
Did we ever, have we ever, advocated a spamming macro? Nope. But this argument deserves its own post, especially in light of the Gruul’s lair WWS information we’re posting. We will discuss Arcane, Steady, and Why Mana-Efficiency Isn’t All It’s Cracked Up To Be in a future post.
And doing what we say sure seems like a surefire recipe for calamitous disaster. You sure you wanna do that?
Ruzgob, if you’re still reading this, how about sending us a screenshot of your DamageMeter report? Is your pet listed, or is your pet being included in your stats? What kind of mages and rogues and warlocks are you running with? Are they much better geared than you are? Are you doing lots and lots of trapping? That will interfere with your damage totals as well.
And remember this: If you’re doing a super-trapping job, your parties are clearing instances, and you’re getting re-invites, you’re probably being a good hunter.
“Dear BRK, I just had the Felstalker Breastplate made. I haven’t equipped it yet because I hate to lose more +hit rating as it’s only 70 now and apparently I have to have Leatherworking in order to get the +20 hit rating. Should I lose the Breastplate of Rapid Striking in favor of the Felstalker BP? And if so what would it be best to socket it with? Don.”
Let’s look at ‘em, shall we?
Felstalker Breastplate
646 Armor
+26 Agility
+26 Intellect
Red Socket
Red Socket
Blue Socket
Socket Bonus: +6 Stamina
Equip: Increases attack power by 52
Breastplate of Rapid Striking
619 Armor
+40 Agility
+20 Intellect
Equip: Improves hit rating by 20
Equip: Increases attack power by 46
The three-piece Felstalker Armor bonus is indeer +20 to Hit, but as you correctly describe, one must be a 350 Leatherworker to enjoy that bonus. But let’s ignore the +hit for one second and look at RAP.
If we put three +6 agility gems in the Felstalker, that would bump us to 44 agility. With the 52 attack power included with the Felstalker, we’d have a total of 96 RAP. With the BPoRS we only have 86. The 44/40 agility comparison means the FSBP would have more crit, too.
Ah, but the BPoRS has that spiffy +20 Hit rating, doesn’t it. Hmm…
Since Don isn’t a leatherworker, even if he got the other Felstalker pieces he wouldn’t make up that Hit rating if he dumped the BPoRS.
If Don can get the +6 agi gems, (don’t blow 150 gold on three +8 agi gems, please?) and is not going to be running Karazhan, the Felstalker will give him more RAP and crit and mana. That’s his gear, right there.
But if Don gets an invite to try heroics or Attumen, Moroes, Maiden, and Opera, he should pack up the +Hit breastplate. That increased hit percentage against those bosses will more than compensate for the lower pure-damage potential of the Felstalker.
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37 Responses to “That’s No Lock, That’s An Outlet”
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great post BRK! lotta info!
dead right on the felstalker analysis…
I, being a LW, had the set for a LONG time, but the belt got replaced with a spiffy PvP belt… so I lost my set bonus.. so, for heroics and (wishful thinking) kara run, I keep a rapid striking BP in the bank and several other pieces for +hit… just in case…
but actually I’ve been using the beast lord curiass, in heroics anyway, the trap time is more important to me. and while I’ve been grinding rep in ogrila and skettis, a tshirt would be good enough
This post is getting bookmarked. Thanks for answering my inquiry to pet specs!
You rock!
btw, I picked up your shopping list for ‘Gearing up for Kara’ for about 200g. I got the Crystalhide handwraps for 100g!!! Can you believe that?!
I’m not 70 yet, but when I hit it, I’ll be hitting it hard and fast.
-Boomsville & Kablamo
Bonechewer
BRK that’s pretty funny you got called out. Especially when,if I remember right, your post wasn’t bragging about taking out the lock,instead it was that it was a wierd experience - the hovering thing. I am sure if BRK wanted to brag about taking down some lethal geared locks, he could.
HEY RHUST! The Beast Lord Curiass falls into the same category as the Sonic Spear, capice?
/grumble
Not certain about your server, but on my server +4hr/+4agi go fairly cheap and would be a good option for felstalker. Infused Nightseye, +8ap/+2mp5 is a great blue socket raiding gem.
I’d even recommend replacing some of your +8ap/+4cr with the +4agi/+4hr gems BRK. You’re not quite to max yet and still at a point will hr will help your raid by a decent amount.
Oh, and you’re not the only hunter who can’t get Sonic Spear or Legacy to drop. Our guild is cursed, we always get Oz. I have no legacy. The one time it dropped and I was there I’d gone AFK before the fight because my son was screaming his head off and they d/e’d the axe instead of waiting for me. I was not a happy hunter, but then again they didn’t expect me to come back.
Irshi of Twisting Nether
pvp server is a ton of fun, always looking over ur shoulder is the way it should be in a war zone, with that said … i barely ever arena or BG … my choice
but somedays, a pve server would make the raids set up faster …
and imo, doesn’t mean we pvp any better or worse and that is a narrowminded point of view ….
@brk
u answer the same as i do when asked, what should i do/spec/wear/slot ….. i ask, what do u think u should do/wear/spec/slot. help them with the pros and cons and make them decide.
like the don santos/wolfslayer/sunfury debate. i read all the theorycrafting on numerous sites saying for my shot/trinket rotation, don santos>wolfslayer>sunfury. but for my setup, i do roughly 22% more dmg with the sunfury. tested all three on Dr boom and all through Gruul/Mag/VR/SSC. now if i was one of those guys who go by what everyone tells me …i would be short 22%.
find out what works for u is the best advice u will ever get.
btw BRK, may the hunter loot gods be with u on gruul and u get the DST right away ….. still waiting for mine …. *sigh
BRK said…
HEY RHUST! The Beast Lord Curiass falls into the same category as the Sonic Spear, capice?
I know,man… maybe the gods know those of us that only get to Kara and Gruul’s in a vicarious fashion, and awards us for ’sticking it out’.. plus, I’m convinced the 2 beast lord pieces I have are from the gods smiling at my ‘lost but now found’ BM spec.
Let me guess. Most of your HK’s have come from running AV, right?
Quit playing on a Carebear server.
Try rolling a toon on a PVP server - then get back to us…
If you’re gonna’ put on pet resistances for Gruul’s Lair, go for Arcane. That’s because most raids have the hunters tank Kiggler the Crazed, a Shaman, and his big attack is an arcane explosion for around 2k. This will help your pet mitigate that damage. And if you have it, rock your Violet Badge for extra survivability.
Once the High King fight is over resistances don’t help much as Gruul deals base and physical damage.
@redforty
I wish those gloves sold for 100g on my server. I’ve only seen it listed once and the bids were already near 500g.
@brk
Even without those two pieces you’ve got good gear so I don’t want to hear too much grumbling.
@lock
Leveling on a PvP server doesn’t make you good at PvP it just means you have to spend more time leveling cause you’ll get ganked by characters higher than you in most contested areas. Heck, my first toon a Tauren Druid on Shattered Hand only has 100 kills and is level 65.
“Why Mana-Efficiency Isn’t All It’s Cracked Up To Be”
I’m sorry, what did you just say?
For Gruul and HKM I would recommend maximizing your pet’s stamina and armor, since cave in damage is mitigated by armor and Gruul doesn’t do any sort of magical damage.
Speaking of resistances and such, what about Aspect of the Wild? I am all for maxing out my dps with AotH or doing the mana thing with AotV but if you are short on Nature resistance would it be recommended to run AotW? It buffs the entire party (including pet) with 60 resistance to nature damage if I remember correctly. Worth it??
Z&Z
Last word in article should be “Rapid Striking” not “Felstalker”.
@PvP Server People
So, um, yeah… Cho’gall is a PvP server. So? Out of my ~13k kills, only maybe ~1000 are form world PvP. The only difference being on a PvP server is that you are pretty much always flagged for PvP, thus your enemies get the drop on you while you are killing something else. I see Horde do it, and I see Alliance do it, so it’s not one-sided. Who cares if he rolls on a PvP server or not? I’m still frickin impressed by anyone that devotes that much time to PvP to get that many kills! Not my cup of tea, but I’m not switching servers.
@ Z&Z - Short answer is YES.
lol@ speccing your pet with resists for any 5man instance (or Kara for that matter).
The ONLY resist you’ll ever need is max arcane resist for Void Reaver.
You’re wasting points by dipping into resists. Max out your pet’s offense and stamina. If you’ve got a couple of points left, fine, put them in a resist.
I haven’t equipped the Felstalker BP so my question is should I just keep Rapid Striking and sell the Felstalker BP, or keep it for other instance runs? Thanks..
Gruul == Armour, all physical damage in there.
The Eye == Fire, Arcane.
SerpentShrine Cavern == Nature, Frost.
I can’t recall what the other instances are, nor am I up to them. I have seen this info elsewhere though. If I do come across it today I’ll add another comment.
These anonymous trolls are growing tiresome. The general virtues of PVP vs PVE has already been discussed, and it as come down to “whatever floats your boat.” More “Uber-than-thou” smack talk about “carebear” servers only increases noise, provides nothing of value, and irritates even lurkers like me.
Grow up, son. Not everyone plays this game like you do.
And now, having hijacked like those that irritate me, I apologize. Please resume prior gear discussions.
Once I hit 40, I respecced and went with 4/5 Frenzy and 2/2 Animal Handler; I might switch to 1/2 AH and 5/5 Frenzy if I want it to proc more often. Bestial Swiftness lost its usefulness to me when I got my mount because my pet disappears and when I’m running around on foot I just use Aspect of the Pack.
yay for the drooling Troll!!!!
/point
/laugh
Great post BRK as always.
Rabid
@Irshi
I presume you were unhappy with yourself. You obviously can’t blame your guild DE an item that the people *present* couldn’t use.
As for your comments regarding BRK and hit rating, you should read a bit more before jumping in and offering advice which naively ignores the ongoing discussion, the data (no recorded misses), and the dwarf factor.
@RyuHakubi
blah, blah, blah, blah, and blah…
I just find it funny when BRK boasts about his 24k kills etc. When you can easily get 100+ from just running one AV.
Better yet - what’s your arena rating?
@anon
derpity derpity derp
I just find it funny that PvP server morons who anonymously talk about carebears think that world PvP is somehow more valuable. All it does is make the lowest echelon of PvP server denizens better at PvP than the lowest PvE server denizens (who probably have never flagged). It doesn’t affect the ceiling of those players who put effort into it. Even if he did get all of those kills from 100 HK AVs, that would mean he did 240 AVs. That’s a lot of effing PvP. When someone like BRK, who obviously puts effort into developing his skills and has enough intelligence to adapt his play, gets that much experience at something they’re going to become good at it.
Better yet–who the hell are you?
@anon
When did BRK boast about his 24k kills? Also, why does it matter what a person arena rating is? All arena is for a lot of people is just doing 10 games so they get arena points and get the gear from it. Not saying its the case for everyone but I know I’ve seen my share of it. As far as AV goes you don’t always get 100 kills as that only occurs when both teams actually play effective defense. I was in an AV which lasted 5 minutes and I only had 2 hks.
1) 24K HK is actually rather disturbing. I think on my Rogue (one of my Lt. Com ranks) I had 5K max when she hit her rank in 5 weeks. Of course this was before proximity honor was awarded.
Actually, the less HK you have, the more likely you actually did productive things in BG such as capturing objectives and winning the game—as opposed to turtling with a WSG flag, turtling Stables as your only node in AB, turtling with the mass mob in AV. I could’ve got alot more HK on each of my toons that way, but I prefer to win (and do notice, both AV games he referenced earlier were losses).
2) Arena Rating = skill. The 10 games a week style of play are for the people with “welfare epics” in mind—mostly PVE people who get 300 points a week and don’t mind waiting months for that weapon just to raid with. And yes, they are terrible because they have given up before they even started to fight for a real rating.
@megan
Exactly.
I may have 20k+ HK’s spread amongst my toons. I could have gotten much more if all I did was guard a node or flag etc. It’s incredibly easy to get HK’s to tell you the truth. You could just go ‘rambo’ mode and attack everything in sight. That doesn’t take skill.
But, in a controlled setting like the arena - greater skill is involved. Because, your rating is entirely dependent upon your win/loss record.
I just started a BM hunter - now at 57. I stopped along the way to BG at the top of each bracket. If I wasn’t always at the top of the charts (or at the least top 3) it was because I didn’t actively seek out hordies to kill. It’s _extremely_ easy to play a hunter in BG’s. So much so - I have now abandoned my other toons to concentrate on my hunter. I _never_ had such an easy time in BG’s before.
It takes much more skill to play a druid well in the BG’s. I don’t even want to talk about the skill involved to play a druid in the arena’s.
This is what I laughed at: “Call us back when you have a scope on your ranged weapon and more than 1/3 of our honor kills and we’ll talk. We blewbies want to learn about PvP.”
Just because you have high HK’s doesn’t mean you are a PVP god.
Q.E.D.
I have to ask about the people who DE’d [Legacy] while you were AFK…what retard wasn’t running as Loot Master? Seriously. They can send the item to you that way and you don’t even have to be there. We do that for all boss fights, and it makes life so much easier.
@Boomsville
I’m way, way behind on reading BRK (why oh why do you post so much, BRK?) so you may never come back and see this. . . but I also have a Blood Elf hunter on Bonechewer! I’ll watch for you and /wave if I see you. I’m a still a lowwwbie though (22) so I’d have to bump into you in an old world city.
Elahnia & Deja
Bonechewer
What would you recommend for pet specs for COT Instances? Old Hilsbrad in particular.
Best Regards,
Hunzul of Runetotem
So, if I said i wear my BL cuirass and my BL shoulders to kara, with the BL pants in the bank because i can’t bear to vendor them, all while wearing my Sonic Spear you might get agitated? lol Well, I have been kinda lucky, but I also put my time in. I could’ve taken the helm as well but gave it to a hunter buddy I run with so he could get his 2-piece bonus over me getting my 4-piece. If it makes you feel better BRK, I cannot get LEgacy, Wolfslayer, or Sunfury to drop for me. Multiple full-kara clears and I am carrying Sonic Spear and Valanos’ bow. (sad mohawk)
Dear brk, i want to know if i should teach my pet growl and claw? I would also like to know if a ravager would be better pvp than my cat.
srry i meen bite and claw
@rastra
yes yes and yes, at least for claw. u really need to train claw on your pet no question about it.
u can skip bite imo, i just use claw growl and dash on my nice little kitty, i find bite beeing to focus consuming to the amount of dmg it actually does. not worth it imo.
and as far as i know, at least in pve, ravagers and cats do more or less the same dps. main difference is ravagers can learn gore which i think has bleed effect as well, i dont really know never used a ravager.
[...] I was over at BRK’s and saw in the comments a guide for setting pet resistances. [...]
Tough getting through all of the digression in these comments — but to any fortunate hunters that make it this far down the thread list, and are legitimately interested in PET RESISTANCES - a great link to end game pet resistance is here: http://www.maxdps.com - check out the hunter forums.
To update BRKs post for some of the other 25-man runs:
Rule #1: dps pet skills trump everything - dump points in Gore, Bite, Avoidance, Cobra, Claw, Rip, Shred whatever — Dash is also pretty clutch - you can never underappreciate a speedy retreat from serious AoE damage. Once these basic talents have been point filled… move on:
Gruuls:
The only damage your pet is taking here is physical - stock the points in full dps (always - especially avoidance rank 2) - and then put the remainder of the points into Natural Armour and Stamina - remember, your pet will receive Fortitude and I would recommend grabbing a scroll of Prot to help out some more. As always - pet control is key - if a Cave In is on melee - get your pet out and toss on an IMP.
SSC:
Like the later 25 mans - different bosses demand different resistances - however, youre fairly safe early on with a combo of Nature/Natural Armour — or Nature/Frost (Hydross + trash). Its generally a tough call since the trash throughout SSC blends some serious physical damage with nature damage - so I almost always rock at least 50% Nature resist.
TK:
Serious physical and arcane damage in this instance. Id go full Arcane and the remainder in Natural armour.
Hyjal/BT - see the post in the hunter forum at http://www.maxdps.com
Good luck huntards.