Only the S3 Axe Remains from Outland
Spaulders of Skillful Maneuvers
We’re holding onto all our T5 for grinding and perhaps pet-tanking in the future. But since we’re having really good luck running instances, we’re going BM Glass-Canon 53/15/3.
When raiding, if our Ferocity pet grabs aggro, no amount of health or armor is going to save him, so why bother. If he gets smashed into itty-bitty Spirit Beast bits, we’ll quickly rez him with Improved Revive Pet. Everything else in both our and our pet’s talent builds are designed to do one thing: top the damage meters against instance bosses, both regular and heroic with little room for pet-error.
Is this a setup for grinding, leveling, or PvP? H3ll no, don’t even think it. But with the quality of tanks and healers we’ve seen in the past two weeks, we think we might just be able to pull off a glass-canon build.
We’ll let you know how it works out.
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interesting have you compared this to 50/21/0 …?
then again if i had a spirit beast i wouldn’t want to spec out of exotics either =D
Whats with that ridiculously low crit chance?!?!
You’re about halfway to the hit cap there. Take three points in Focused Aim and drop your cap to 196 and you’ll be a lot closer.
Very good insight, but there’s a VERY specific reason we didn’t do exactly that: We’re not Missing. At least not yet according to Recount. We check our Recount report after every boss fight in our regular 5-mans and we’re not missing at all.
Once we start Missing, we’ll add more +Hit. Until then, not gonna do it.
BRK – Look into getting Honored with Wyrmrest Accord (you probably allready are). Then buy 2 x Fang of Truth. They’re hit licious, got tons more AP and stm and they look kindda cool too
Try visiting the forums and reading a couple of the topics, there’s plenty of gear tips there
We check our Recount report after every boss fight in our regular 5-mans and we’re not missing at all.
Well right, because you’re a 80 fighting 81s – that’s only a 6% miss chance. 81s != raid bosses.
And I still dunno why you have that rubbish axe – what you need are two Savage Cobalt Slicers.
Fang of Truth >> Savage Cobalt Slicers
Savage Cobalt Slicers >> Fang of Truth
Icier Barbed Spear > Vengeful Waraxe.
Though I would take Savage Cobalt Slicers > Fang of Truth in that arguement too.
Especially if he’s “not Missing”.
Fang of Truth >> Savage Cobalt Slicers
24 Agi and 24 AP > 8 Hit
http://www.wowhead.com/?compare=44187;41182
Well, yes.. Those Savage Cobalt Slicers does look a bit more spiffy, idd.. I just bought and advocated for Fang Of Truth because of the relative cheapness and ease of getting them, but as the prices of ore and BS services drop from the first frenzy, you could get them aswell.
As to BRK’s hit : 149 = 4.55% hit. Lvl 81 boss (normal lvl 80 instance) needs 5.5% hit = should see 1% misses, but with the anomaly of RNG and so on, it might not have kicked in yet. Once he gets into heroics and lvl 82 bosses, he should get 1.5% miss.. and vs. raid bosses he should have 4.5% miss = VERY noticable.
@ Danny and crit chance : Untill you get into some LK blues n epix for real, your crit chance is gonna be low. With full T6+t6.5 and equivalent gear, I was around 19.5% when I started to upgrade. Now, after heroics and raids, I’m at 26% and rising again.
Are you sure you put those 3 points in survival correctly? You don’t want the extra 6 yards range?
[i]Are you sure you put those 3 points in survival correctly? You don’t want the extra 6 yards range?[/i]
Dmg >>>>>>> range
Damn, wrong tags (still early) and edit doesn’t work…
What about grabing thse amazing gear piece for a very little amount of work!
Runeblade of Demonstrable Power, BRK. over the S3 old hat.
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=44249
Spualders of the Black Arrow
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=44257
I just did a heroic Strat…I have a hit rating of 248 (7.56%) and my only misses were in melee (I think it’s faster to melee the non-elites that happen to aggro me from behind during the elite fights then try to drag them over to the tank…less down time from my main duties.) Maybe BRK is onto something with the hit rating not actually being 9% as has been calculated on the various forums.
Don’t forget to pick up an improved Hawk glyph
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=42909
Hey BRK (and everyone else)
With the 2pts you have in Spirit Bond, and heading for a pure dps type of build, wouldn’t they be better served in either the Imp Tracking to cap it at an extra 5% (rather than the 3% it currently is), or maybe slot them into Invigoration to combo off the Cobra Strikes/Fercocity bonus’s. That way you can stay in IAotH/DH with the increased mana regen ?
I’m just getting back into WOW after a long break. Just wondering why your Crit seems so low? Is it no long important for BMs?
Is there math or theorycrafting that shows having cobra strikes a definitive DPS increase? I feel it’s proc rate is a tad too random for my tastes.
There’s a couple of decent 2h weaps you could use to replace that s3 axe. Oculus drops a real nice axe, provided you aren’t running with an arms warrior, or grind rep with the Knights of the Ebon Blade for a 2h sword. Hmm…anyone else notice the real lack of decent 2h weapons for us outside of raiding?
For those of you complaining that his crit is too low .. do you not remember what your crit rating was at 70 when you first dinged? Early gear is not laden with +crit, most of that appears in raid gear. And guess what, BRK isn’t raiding regularly yet to pick up alot of that +crit gear. Suprise, his crit isn’t as high as yours in full S2 welfare (which I might also add was itemized specifically to have high crit)
Icier Barbed Spear – just nailed this last night with a PUG while dinging 78 after completed the Arena of Anguish Achievement!
I love this Polearm…
BRK, have you thought about dual wielding cobalt slicers? You can have a BS in your guild make you a couple just to try out.
That’s: +88 AGI, +58HR, and +120AP if you dual wield them.
Then throw on an enchant of Superior Potency for an additional +65 AP, and since you are dual wielding weapons, that means multiply that by 2, and now you have an additional +130 AP.
Vs. the S3 axe: +15HR, +46 Crit, +33 resil, +92 AP, and + 14 Armor Pen.
So, you loose a lot of STA, some resil, and some Armor pen, but you gain a ton of AGI and AP. The HR is also huge, which can free up some slots to be filled with something else. Might be worth trying out
I will be very curious to see what comes of the Hit cap mystery. In the forums it was reported that with 3/3 in careful aim only 164 hit was actually necessary against lvl 83 bosses instead of the agreed on 197 (8% vs 9%). This test was done against the riad boss target dummy, so it was wondered if the dummy was broken. Has the hit mechanic for hunters changed, therefore the reason for lack of hit rating on gear, or is something broken.
On another front…BRK, is there a reason for having both GftT and BD? I was under the inpression that 2/2 in GftT was sufficient. Is it because your crit rating is so low atm, and once it gets to 30-35% you will move those points?
BTW, I am totally salivating at 3k AP unbuffed, just plain awsome!!!
Why 3/3 in longevity i thought that f up the spirit strike?
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=44053
Kalu’ak Rep isnt to bad to get started till you get something from heroics
Kalu’ak Rep isnt to bad to get started till you get something from heroics
BRK, could you post a grinding, questing build for a NOT very well geared hunter. I have several of those…
I will probably not raid anymore, or even group much, it is too hard, but I would like to be the best solo/run-with-my-patient-son person that I can.
I still don’t see a reason why you still haven’t replaced your S3 Waraxe BRK…
Especially with all the loot just sitting out there…
I replaced my waraxe at level 74 =/
I think http://www.wowhead.com/?item=36962 is the ideal pre-heroic hunter weapon.
Out of curiosity, why the extra 2 ranks of Cobra Strikes? Don’t you think you could do more dps if you put 2 more ranks into Improved Tracking (which would be +2%dmg basically)?
On a different topic, BRK, have you retired Hobbes?
There are three “n”s in Cannon.
Farewell Hobbes.
/got nuthin’
@ Frostheim
BRK cant put the 2 pts from CS to Imp Tracking because then he would lose the BM 51 pt talent and also his Spirit Beast…NOT! going to happen
Part of me wonders if people are even looking at the stats of two Savage Cobalt Slicers and comparing them to all this rubbish that they keep suggesting.
Dual Savage Cobalt Slicers are, when enchanted with +50 AP, stronger than any two-hander or pair of one-handers that I can find pre-Naxxramas.
And if a pair of level 74 blues lasts you from level 74 to raiding, I think the cost of 16 Cobalt, 12 Saronite, and 4 Crystallized Fire (which is NOTHING) is worth it.
Those shoulders are kinda understated no?
After seeing the lightning flashing shoulders for so long it seems odd not to have electricity flashing around your head.
Just a question about the Pet talent tree. I wonder if improved cower (I know, blasphemy) might be better for ferocity pets instead of charge/dash with its 10% damage reduction paired with the AOE reduction from Avoidance… Yes your pet doesn’t dash in, but I find that helpful if I accidently target something the pet shouldn’t start attacking… but that’s the huntard in me.
@baseballj
Incorrect.
He currently has 53 pts in BM — he can remove 2 and still take the 51 pt beast mastery talent.
I know you probably get told this all the time, but I just discovered your blog and I can’t wait till next time I visit.
Awesomely entertaining
Why isn’t anyone asking why you take the exotic pets at all if you’re discussing his gear in a min/max way? 50/21 is a higher hunter+pet dps build, no?
@ BMPvPhunter
I don’t think anything has been proven yet. SK gaming ( can’t remember the new name) hunters are all using the 54/17 or the one BRK has here from what I have seen. All the hunters on my server in the top 2 guilds have the 51point
Regarding the 51 Points – The biggest boost, to a certain extent, is the extra 4 points for the pets. Allows a lot of different combos for getting all 3 major talents at the bottom of the tree. The exotics are just a nice bonus.
When AOE farming or clutch tanking, my gorilla with 4 extra points gets really nice heals from mend pet, and seems to hold Aggro much better. I’m not seeing a huge improvement in my cat, but its a regular old Shy-rotam, not a fancy spirit beast (which look really nice).
I’ll be working on tracking one of those down once I hit 76/77 and can get into sholazar basin…
I got to start running Heroics, I have literally only replaced 3 items and I’m sporting anything that I would not have considered high end stuff.
Sorry Frost,
I need to L2Read completely. Thanks for the correction.
@ Mason – thanks for the tip! I just realized that I am revered with The Kalu’ak (duh been too busy flyin and trying to track the spirit beast…) I am defintely going for that Polearm when i get home today!
PS I have yet to see any Hunters with the Spirit Beast on Aman’Thul, maybe today is my lucky day /grin
~ Hunter Noob? BRK Fo’shizzle!
Since I have no Spirit Beast, I run a cat with a similar set up
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=ctbMztxRwu0esx0eVbZL
no Beast Mastery, no Spirit Bond
1/2 ImpMendPet for the 25% chance cleanse
4/5 tracking
Thinking about dropping Longevity to 2/3 to fill out Tracking but I’m not sure on the math.
And yes, people must just not be looking at the Cobalt Slicers in regards to all this other stuff they’re linking..
Finding a BS isn’t that hard. Grinding gold (quest reward gold for that matter) is not hard to come by.
These things last well into your raiding career in Wrath.
They’re better than most of the other stuff you can get and easier to acquire too.
Thanks for the advice, its Cobalt Slicers for me.
Also I was sad to see the Mark S Boomstick is BOP, as my hunter is not my engineer. Sad because I didnt read it was BOP and made 2 Boomsticks. Oh well I got 2 skill ups at any rate.
@Frostheim
He can remove two points but they would be from the bloat of the deep of the tree, and not Spirit Bond (it’s needed to go further into the tree). Though I personally would have put those two in Imp Pet Mend cause I heal my own pet more than anyone else in instances.
A question about BM builds (but not your glass canon build). Now that Improved Aspect of the Monkey adds 6% (at max) dodge chance to Aspect of the Monkey AND Aspect of the Dragonhawk, should we consider putting 3 points into that? That makes us have 27% dodge chance with Aspect of the DragonHawk. Hope you answer. =] I just hit 80 today and was adjusting my talent points and saw that now it adds into Aspect of the DragonHawk and thought it might actually be good now.