Readers Ask, We Answer
“Dear BRK, I’m rerolling a hunter, and would like to know what pet would do good at leveling with the BM talent spec you recommend?
“Also, should I have two or maybe three pets for different situations like instances etc, or could just one pet serve me well when leveling from lvl 10 to 70?
“And lastly, could you recommend what abilities should I be leveling up for the pet? Any help is really appreciated! Jussa”
Boars are far and above the best leveling pets, bar none. Get a boar as soon as you can, keep it forever.
After boars, any pet with Dash/Dive is great for getting to your target quickly.
After Dash/Dive pets, pick something you like. In fact, pick something you like over boars if you want to. There’s nothing more fun than seeing a level 70 turtle in Alterac Valley.
Do you need different pets for Azeroth? Nah. Outland? Sure, if your pet is going to be tanking 5-person instances. Get a big-armor, big-health pet for off-tanking and enjoy the fun. Once you start doing heroics and Kara, off-tanking pets don’t work any more, so stick with the DPS-pets or whatever you love.
“Dear BRK, have you tried AG Unit Frames? Jon”
Nope, but we’ve heard good things about it. Why just the other day, Justo sent us a screenshot of his UI using AG Unit Frames. This guy is full Tier 6 geared and raiding Black Temple like it was Deadmines!
“Dear BRK, what should be the standard of pets for raiding? Jack”
Your pet should be able to help your raid, not just you. Work with your tank to determine if he can work with a big flapping bird in his face, don’t just show up with one. Screech is a great raid-spell for pets, but not at the expense of your tank’s sanity.
If you are frequently put in a physical-DPS group, a wolf and Furious Howl isn’t bad at all. The high-end DPS pets are, of course, perfectly acceptable. Focus-dump pets like cats and ravagers, pets that can learn Claw or Gore, are all about bring the Pain.
“Dear BRK, I posted about [a Feign Death Bug] on the PTR forums, and now I’m getting semi-flamed by other people who can’t be bothered to test themselves but are perfectly happy to criticize every conceivable mistake on my part that could have caused the problem…
“I thought maybe you could take a minute to read over the thread and check the scenarios I’ve already tested to see what you think. If you agree that something seems off, perhaps throw in a post and maybe someone will take the situation seriously? Kailope”
We’ve read up on it and we don’t think you’ve found a bug.
When your pet attacks, you are put in combat. You attack, you rise on the mob’s threat list. You FD, you are removed from the mob’s threat list and are out of combat. If your pet is still attacking when you quit channeling FD and stand up, you will re-enter combat. Let your pet die before standing up, and you’ll be out of combat when you stand up.
Do you all read The Crafter’s Tome?and Kailope’s blog? You should!
“Dear BRK, what would you suggest? Should I keep engineering and start grinding for gun/schematic drops? Or would I be better off just going double-gather and grinding for the actual guns themselves? Rades”
We’d recommend dropping engineering while you can, but be aware that those in the Engineering Clan will respond with “ROFLCOPTR FTW!”
If you love gold and all the stuff it can buy, double-gathering is the schiznit. If you love having Tier 4 and Tier 5 gear before your buddies even start Kara, leatherworking pwns. And if you love the Toys engineering brings, then by all means stick with it. It all depends on what turns you on.
“Dear BRK, does Hobbes have any troubles holding Aggro when you are spamming your 1 to 1 macro? Or do you use FD often to avoid that issue? Tom”
We no uses da macro! Nein macro! Nyet macro! No no no!
/frustrated!
We allow Hobbes to establish aggro, about 1.5k worth on the Omen meter, before we let loose with DPS. When grinding, we don’t do much more than Serpent Sting and Auto Shot, maybe an Arcane to finish the mob off. Yes we’ll FD if the mob is a persistent b@stard and doesn’t die in four seconds. Use Omen when grinding and leveling and you’ll have no problems letting your pet maintain aggro.
The sooner one becomes Omen-proficient, they better a hunter one will be.
Kohelani on 22 Mar 2008 at 2:40 pm #
“If you love having Tier 4 and Tier 5 gear before your buddies even start Kara, leatherworking pwns.”
How does this work exactly?
mwahahah on 22 Mar 2008 at 2:57 pm #
dragonscale leatherworking
Zahana on 22 Mar 2008 at 3:08 pm #
@ Kohelani
With leatherworking you can craft the Ebon Nether set from Dragonscale Leatherworking, and you can purchase recipes to create b.o.p. items from SSC/TK/BT etc.
scathatch on 22 Mar 2008 at 3:16 pm #
On the pet thing I have to say have a pet to solo with (don’t give it cobra reflexes). for raiding pay attention to resistances compared to bosses you plan on downing (as BM this will help your pets survivability) don’t forget you can retrain your pets for 10 silver at the same place you buy pet skills ie hunters rise in thunder bluff.
Feist on 22 Mar 2008 at 4:34 pm #
Thanks to the Zapthrottle Mote Extractor, Engineering is in fact the BEST moneymaking profession in game right now.
The PERFECT companion to mining once you get to outlands.
Super_Duck on 22 Mar 2008 at 5:32 pm #
If i had the money i’d have got some bt shoulder pattern, the hearts of darkness and crafted some awesome shoulders with HASTE RATING!!! sadly i didnt at the time i saw them ;(
http://thottbot.com/i32575
kunukia on 22 Mar 2008 at 5:36 pm #
ROFLCOPTR FTW!!!
I have three 70 hunters*, a leatherworker, an alchemist and an engineer. That is because I LOVE professions, I love making my own ammo and other stuff. I don’t care if it would have been cheaper or more efficient to just gather, it is the part of the game that is fun for me.
*Yes, all the same server, same faction, and all lady Dwarfs. Only one raids, the others farm and enjoy themselves.
Iron on 23 Mar 2008 at 4:17 am #
Following the let down of Engineering in tbc; Wotlk brings many boosts to the profession including the new epic lazer rifle.
Hyper lazer cannon cow of d00m ganks BRK for 999999 damage.
BRK dies.
BRK has quit WoW.
Doogie2K on 23 Mar 2008 at 10:14 am #
I dunno if there’s Hunter goggles to match some of the others, but there’s a Pally in the guild who has different Engineering goggles for different specs, and says they’re T5-equivalent.
dave on 23 Mar 2008 at 1:23 pm #
BRK,
I’m surprised you only talk only about the guns and the toys when mentioning engineering. I would think that a hunter would always consider engineering as a raid saver when combining feign death with jumper cables to rez a rezzer.
As a guild master just starting out I would love to have my rogues and hunters as engineers.
Nick S. on 23 Mar 2008 at 1:51 pm #
engineering does bring incredible utility. if it’s a tossup between two roughly equal hunters, the one with the repair bot is coming….
plus, without engineers, who’s going to put shiny scopes on your guns?
Nifen on 24 Mar 2008 at 8:33 am #
Copters, schmopters. As mentioned, at level 70, engineering/mining is probably the most lucrative pair of professions in the game right now thanks to the Zapthrottle Mote Extractor. At the right time of day I can clear 300g an hour. Leveling it is still a pain, but the light at the end of the tunnel is bright indeed. Also, I think that as a hunter you will appreciate the ability to possibly be a hero with Goblin Jumper Cables in the event of a wipe.
Brandstone on 24 Mar 2008 at 10:10 am #
You don’t have to let your pet die to stay out of combat when you come out of Feign death. Just put it on passive so it stops attacking, you will stay out of combat, be able to mount up, and when your pet dissappears the mob will de-aggro completely and run back to where it came from. I wrote up a few tricks you can do with pets and alt chars.
Esoth on 24 Mar 2008 at 10:31 am #
Dear BRK,
Why is the question mark where the letter “E” should be on that keyboard pic?
Kaliope on 24 Mar 2008 at 6:01 pm #
Hi BRK - just want to thank you for reading and posting on my FD issue. I finally spend about an hour flipping between my live hunter and PTR hunter testing various scenarios to see if there were any differences in behavior and did not find any except possibly one which could have been a resist problem. Either way, I appreciate you weighing in on it, I felt like I was getting nowhere with the PTR folks. Ultimately I had to sit down and test it myself to see what does/does not work.
The part I find funny is that it would take forever to let my pet die, it’s actually quicker to just kill the mob that jumps me
Valax on 25 Mar 2008 at 10:35 am #
So when you’re grinding, you don’t even break out Steady Shot? That’s my bread-and-butter while Arcane Shot gathers dust on my bar. Do you feel it generates too much threat in a solo situation?
Boulder on 26 Mar 2008 at 1:07 am #
i want to know justo’s UI compilation. that’s a clean setup