It’s a four pack. No, there are five. OMG it’s six-pack. /shudder

You’ve got a mage and a rogue and that’s good. But you, Mr. Hunter, are about to be pressed into service into another role in addition to providing large quantities of sustained, ranged DPS.

Welcome to Crowd Control City, population you.

This is Chain Trapping, my friend, and the mechanics behind it are intricate and detailed. So let’s do what we always do when presented with a stressful situation where our reputation and membership in the BRK Hunter Pantheon of Excellence is in danger.

We cheat.

OK, cheating isn’t really the answer, but practice is. BRK takes his trappers to Arathi Highlands for training, so hop the Refugee Point Express and meet us there.

Remember our raptors from our kiting training? They’re back. Remember those figure-eights through the camp we made you do? Welcome to your past because we’re gonna do them again.

Let’s find a nice pretty raptor… ah, there’s one. Let’s name him Chucky. OK, we’re gonna trap Chucky and kill him. Drop your freezing trap, target Chuckster and fire. Here’s he comes, right into the trap, and *pop* there he is. Notice how your Auto Fire button is still flashing? What happens if you run more than eight yards away and turn toward your trapped Chuck? Try it.

OO! Lookie, you just fired at Chuck and broke his trap. That’s not good is it. How do we fix that? Well, when we want to trap a mob, we use our Pull Shot Macro:

/cast Arcane Shot(Rank 1)
/stopcasting

This will keep our Auto Fire from turning on and prevent us from accidentally freeing our trapped mob. Very important this is. Let’s try another Chucky.

Trap down, nice Pull Shot, here he comes… and *pop* in the trap. WooT. Your Auto Fire is off so it’s safe to run around. Let’s do just that and run down the road a bit. Further, further.. ok stop. Is your Freeze Trap cooldown up? Yes? Go ahead and drop another.

Oh look! Chucky is free and he’s coming right for you! Ahh.. now you see, don’t you. Stay right beside your trap, here he comes, and *pop* he’s trapped again. That was your first chain trap, nicely done.

Here’s the Big Points about chain trapping.

• Your trap can exist without going off for 60 seconds.
• Your trap cooldown is 30 seconds.
• A mob will remain trapped for 20 seconds.
• You can only have one trap down at a time.

Because of all these facts, you have a lot of time-management for which you must account.

Let’s try another raptor. Drop your trap and wait. Your trap can exists for 60 seconds, remember? Let it sit and ponder Chain Trapping, what are we waiting for?

The trap cooldown, that’s right. If we wait at least 30 seconds before trapping Chucky, we’ll have a fresh trap to put down in case Chucky resists the first trap. The lesson is that we don’t drop our trap the second before the mob we want to trap arrives; we want to drop it as soon as possible before the pull so that our trap cooldown is up in case of a resist.

Your trap cooldown is up, so pull Chucky. Nice Pull Shot and *pop*. Now run down the hill into the camp. That’s far enough, now drop your next trap. Good. Chuck has been trapped for 10 seconds so you have another 10 seconds before Chucky is freed. But remember too that it takes Chucky 10 seconds to run the same distance you did. Since we know where he is, where he is going, and how long it will take him to get to us, we can consider this “run to the hunter” time as trapped-time or crowd-controlled-time, whatever you prefer.

Now take Chuckurinio on a nice figure-eight, chain trapping the whole way. Good. OK, let’s head off somewhere a little harder.

Shadow Lab.

We’ve already cleared the first boss and are about to start clearing Blackheart the Inciter’s trash mobs. The first two packs are four-pack and we’ve got the Blue Square. We’re going to be pulling into the clear room behind us, so how do we start our chain trapping? Before the tank pulls, we go back into the cleared room and head off to a side area where we’re sure the AoE damage isn’t going to occur, drop our trap, return and stand beside the tank, target our Blue Square and wait.

The party is ready and the tank pulls. The Blue Square mob comes into range and we smack our Pull Shot. We’ve got aggro! Our Auto Shot is off thanks to our macro so we just turn and run for the trap. We arrive, stop, turn around, watch Blue Square come at us and *pop* he’s ours. Smack your Assist macro which causes your to automatically target the tank’s target, smash your Pet Attack macro and off your pet races to begin DPSing.

Done properly, the tank has pulled his target down the tunnel and inside the cleared room. Start running to the other side of the cleared room, putting some distance between you and your trapped mob. DPS the tank’s target as you run, but once you reach a safe position, stop and DPS like a madman.

But keep watching your trap cooldown. As soon as it’s up, drop another trap. If you’ve timed everything well, your second trap should be down before Blue Square has broken free.

That’s exactly how it goes down, how lucky for you. But eventually Blue Square is freed abd running at you. Remind the rest of the party that you’ve got him and not to fear or off-tank him. Oh good, they left him alone and he’s still coming your way. Yay and *pop* he’s trapped again.

Get on the move one more time, back to the position of the original trap. By now your party should be finishing the third mob and the tank will be able to pick up your trapped mob, but be ready for an early trap-break anyway. Watch your trap cooldown and as soon as it’s up, drop your trap.

When you do the five-pack mobs, you might need to trap three times. When you do the six-pack mobs, you may need to do four. Yes, it’s very engaging work and, when done properly, is tremendously fun and will earn you heaps of accolades.

There are things that can go wrong, of course, such as Blue Square gets hit with an AOE and he aggros someone else. Target him and blast him until you get aggro back. Once he’s running at you again, manually turn off Auto Shot and you’re back in the chain-trapping game.

What if Blue Square gets feared or hit with a DoT debuff? Well, then it’s hopeless to try to trap him again. If there is a free mob running amok, tell the rest of the party that you’re trapping him, like, “Hunter is Trapping Circle!”

Always remember that good communications will keep a party alive in a tough spot. BRK has been in a party that has pulled one of the six-pack mobs and the level 71-elite demon and survived because of chain trapping and excellent communications.

And he has seen that same party wipe on the non-elite skeletons before Vorpil because of bad communications. Boy, that was really funny.

When we get a question at the BRK North-American Centralized Digital Communication and Ice Cream Bunker, the email is pretty specific. For example, look at my gear, check my talents, which gun is best, do you like walks on a beach under the moonlight, where can I buy some BRK Mojo, etc.

But sometimes, buried within that question is a deep, theological conundrum… and occasionally a blatant demand for kitty-kisses. The latter we forward to a more personal inbox, but the former gets special blog-attention.

BRK loves to focus on the foundation of Hunterism and Hunteristics, (both terms are hereby copyrighted by BRK Entertainment Ltd. and may not be used without the express written permission of Major League Baseball).

Without a solid understanding of the mechanics and principals of the basic elements of ranged combat with a pet, the intricacies and nuances are really not important. The concept of a Shot Rotation is such an animal.

BRK received a lengthy and kind email within which contained a question about Sting Shots and their usefullness. However, this particular sentence really caught our eyes:

“My shot rotation is usually: send in pet, hunter’s mark, concussive shot, steady shot, {serpent sting}, arcane shot and then auto shot and arcane till mob dead.”

Before we get into a lengthy diatribe, rowdy rebuttal, and messy food fight about the pros and cons of Sting Shots, we’ve got to straighten out this shot selection sequence. Do you know what’s wrong? Yes? No? Bueller?

Either way, let’s go back to the most basic question: What’s the best way to kill a mob.

The answer, of course, is: “It depends”.

PvE or PvP?
Instance with lots of help, or solo?
Lots of possible adds or all alone?
Sober and alert or drunk and slobbering on the keyboard?

The answers to these questions help form the fundamental principal of:

Efficiency versus Expediency - do you need to kill while conserving resources, or kill quickly regardless of the consequences. What BRK considers the optimum solution is to maximize both. This is the foundation of a Shot Rotation.

BRK-Definition of Shot Rotation - Preserving resources as much as possible while delivering the most damage possible while not pulling aggro from the pet/tank.

A Shot Rotation is not the Maximum DPS Possible. Any fool can blow every cooldown and fire every shot whenever their cooldown is up. Pfft. BRK calls this Rambo Mode and it is not recommended for instances or PvE.

Of course, BRK is a strong advocate of using it in PvP. Screaming inarticulate guttural animal sounds in Rambo Mode is optional, but highly recommended; it’s a hoot.

But BRK digresses.

Many people believe that there is a maximum Shot Rotation, and they’ve discovered it, and if you don’t follow their plan perfectly, you’re a n00b.

Bullpucky.

The Perfect Shot Rotation is a one-shot kill. One bullet, one kill; nothing more efficient than that is there; anything less is sub-optimal. Knowing this, we are free from trying to mold ourselves to some incorrectly-calculated shot rotation based upon a specific 2.7 weapon speed and 1700 RAP and cooldown-sequencing and pet attack speed and the high tide in Perth Amboy and other such hogwash.

Your Shot Rotation is dependent upon your gear. And as such, it shall change over time, so don’t be afraid to experiment. But this is a discussion for Advanced Shot Rotation Techniques, and we were talking about The Basics. Digressing canceled.

The basics of a Shot Rotation do not take weapon speed or any other trivia or stats into account. Now then, it’s just you, your pet, and one mob, ok? Here we go.

The Basic Shot Rotation

Step 1. Macro that sends pet and Hunter’s Marks.

/petattack
/cast Hunter’s Mark

Bind it to an easy-to-find key as you’ll use this a lot. BRK has it mapped to one of his extra mouse-buttons. Macros make your life so much easier, why aren’t you using them?

Step 2. Wait.

Don’t fire anything; allow you pet to reach the target and Growl. Growl is like Sunder in that it builds aggro. Pulling the mob off your pet is a Bad Thing, so let your pet Growl and commence fighting before you get wacky and drop an Aimed Shot on it, ok? Sheesh.

Step 3. Serpent Sting.

Get the maximum out of your Damage Over Time debuff by applying it immediately. What is the best Serpent Sting right now, 555 damage over 15 seconds? Something like that? It’s not the best debuff in the game, BRK admits, but get the most damage for your mana-buck and fire it first.

Step 4. Arcane Shot.

Does BRK need to say anything? Is anybody not using Arcane Shot? We didn’t think so.

Step 5. Multi Shot.

Never forget your Multi Shot, especially you Marksman who have talent points spent in improving its damage and crit. Yes, you can get into a lot of trouble with Multi Shot and crowd-controlled mobs, but the solution isn’t to ignore Multi Shot; the solution is to master it and know how to fire so that you don’t hit CC’d mobs. That smells suspiciously like another blog post, doesn’t it?

Step 6. Watch Your Cooldowns.

When your cooldown on Arcane and Multi Shot are ready, fire em again. BRK loves the Cooldown Timers addon that puts a nice graphical bar and countdown clock for each spell so I can see at a glance which spells are not cooled-down, and how long it will be until they are. BRK Growl of Approval for Cooldown Timers.

Step 7. Watch Your Sting.

Watch it and reapply it when necessary. You should develop an inner-clock that tells you it is about to run its course. Some hunters use an addon that tracks the debuff length, BRK doesn’t; he’s got the mojo working and knows when to reapply Serpent Sting just as it wears off.

Step 8. Prevent Adds.

If the mob starts to run away and possibly aggro another mob, use Concussive Shot and/or Intimidation. Don’t blow these two spells any earlier as you can use them to prevent adds if a mob tries to flee.

And frankly, that’s it, folks. Steady Shot, Kill Command, Aimed Shot, and everything else is a matter of taste and preference. BRK likes Kill Command as it generates extra aggro for Hobbes, others prefer Steady Shot as it will crit nicely if you are spec’d properly.

Remember not to pop Steady or Aimed Shot as your first shot into a fight. Pulling aggro of your pet is Not Good. You have a pet for a reason, and that reason is so that you don’t have to melee.

And you know not to let BRK catch you meleeing. I’m not saying; I’m just saying.

The Diet Coke of Evil is out of the basement and back on WoW. We in Legendary are thrilled, and of course a little nervous, but that’s natural. If you’re on Madoran, say Hello to Ozma. She loves people… ok, she hates people, but she’s not reading this…

“I’d like to talk to you about your positions on warriors and how they pull sometime in the near future too. No scopes. Damage dealt with a pull is not necessary. Stats are nice. How far should a warrior go in gearing ranged weapons for pulls? Any comments”

You people and your questions designed to piss me off are just getting to be too much. Let me say, let me state for the record, let me be heard far and wide, let the bells ring and the banners wave,

There is never a good reason to let a warrior pull, excluding ignorance and laziness. Period.

Just a second, I’m gonna need some cocoa for this post.

…

Ooo, dark chocolate, yum.

…

{sip}

Ok, then. Let’s run down some reasons why warriors pull:

I want to build aggro as soon as I can so that my rage will increase quickly.

This situation assumes that there is a single target, say a boss in an instance, and the possibility of aggro’ing other mobs is nil, right? The warrior wants aggro, we all understand that and we all want that. We hunters want you to tank, plate-boy, so let us help you.

If there is a warrior who can generate more aggro with his ranged weapon than I can with Misdirection and a 3000 crit Aimed Shot, followed by a 1500 crit Arcane Shot, I’ll quit WoW and go play Dr. Seuss’s ‘Pet The Lorax’ for WII. Do not give me any excuse other than you’re inexperienced playing with a competent hunter. That I’ll believe, but then let me educate you. If you insist on pulling, you’ve just proved the axiom that Warriors are designed for those who hate to think.

I don’t want to have to Taunt aggro off of a Hunter.

I don’t play a warrior. I’ve tried, I was terrible, so I quit. If you, as a professional tank, are incapable of getting aggro from a mob to whom I’ve done a measly 140 damage, you too should hang up your gear and get a WII controller. But if you really and truly need even less aggro on me, then I’ll Feign Death as soon as the mob is standing on your toes; you don’t even have to move. Taunt is a spell, right? It’s on your action bar somewhere? You have the ability to press that button at a specific time?

Nobody knows how to Wait For Sunders anymore. They just start pounding DPS before the mob is with five yards of me, and if I don’t pull and at least have a chance to do my job - a job I’m d@mn good at - I’m gonna go postal on some stupid squishy and I don’t want to get banned for violating the WoW TOS.

Now this BRK understands, has witnessed, and fights against. We totally sympathize and want to help. BRK understands that soloing a protection warrior is not easy; Mr Tank, you have a friend in me. Let me aid you. We hunters want nothing more than to serve you mob after mob on a nice silver platter. It is our pleasure to save your repair bills and prevent wipes from bad pulls by using The Ultimate Zone of Perfect Safety. You think healers are the only ones who care about you?

No, baby, we care about you. We know how you feel, how you hurt. That’s right sweetie, just relax for a while and let us take pamper you. Don’t cry, it’s OK, we’re here. Those mean mages and rogues won’t come between us; we’re gonna be good to you, we promise. Priests will heal your body, but hunters will soothe your mind and ease your troubled heart.

Next time we’re against a three-mob pack, we’re gonna tell the mage to sheep the Circle, and we’re gonna Freeze Trap the Square. We’re gonna tell everybody not to DPS until told to do so. We’re gonna cast Misdirection on you, then gently tag the mob marked with a Skull every so gently with our Arcane Shot (Rank 1) to pull that group, and no other mobs or patrols, right at you. The Circle will get sheeped, the Square will be Frozen, and the Skull will run right to you. Yeah… just like that, we know how you like it right there, don’t you. Just get in defensive stance and do your thing. No running, no nasty bows, and your shield is right there, all toasty warm and ready for you.

Now, you go ahead and Sunder. We’re gonna tell the party again that nobody except the Hunter is to fire until told to do so. Misdirection still has two more shots available to give you aggro, so we’re gonna give you a nice Aimed Shot and then a big Arcane Shot. Your Sunders and our +3000 damage that’s been Misdirected onto you means that mob isn’t going anywhere; it’s all yours. We’re gonna tell the rest of the party to start DPS’ing and you just let us take it down nice and fast.

There, it’s pretty and dead, you didn’t even have to move. Feel better baby? OK, now the mob in the trap is still aggro’d from the Misdirections, so go ahead wait for the trap to break, or if you want to, go get it. Yeah, sweetie, if you want to break that ice, you just do it. Oo! So powerful! BRK is all a-quiver just watching you. There are your Sunders, so we’ll tell the gang to DPS… and that’s two down.

Now there’s the sheep. Oh my! Look at you so excited! You just ran over there and did some cool karate-chop thing with that blood-slicked sword! How wonderful! Sunders, DPS… and down it goes. Look at that smile on your face! Oh, sweetie, I know, don’t cry; it’s beautiful when crowd control, aggro control, and Focused Fire DPS work together… here’s a tissue, just sit for a few minutes, BRK has a conclusion to write, ok?

Shh… ok, keep quiet, our tank is resting, so let’s discuss the rest of the question. It is BRK’s opinion that a warrior should have a ranged weapon for stats, just like a hunter should have a melee weapon for stats. If a warrior wants to waste money on a scope, BRK isn’t going to complain, but you really don’t need it.

Let Hunters Pull. Don’t make tanks have to try to pull a single mob from a pack and have to live with the guilt of wiping the party because they have zero aggro-mitigation skills. Don’t make them run into a room and try to fire when a hunter has practically double their range and can attack from the safety of a doorway. Give your tanks all the aggro they could possible want by using Misdirection.

And please, everybody, don’t attack the mob before the tank has not only established, but solidified aggro. Just because they wear plate doesn’t mean they don’t have a delicate constitution and a frail disposition.

Tanks are people too, you know.

So BRK was cruising around Adventures in Azeroth and in a nice post about druid tricks of the trade, Amanna asked “…post your favorite Druid tip or trick that you use on a regular basis to give yourself a little edge.” And BRK did; he gave a nice tip on how a hunter can get some quick downtime during a battle with a druid.

Of course, she was looking for ways to help druids, not kill them. She replied that she should come here and give druid tips on killing hunters. But she didn’t know any.

Awww…

So, in an attempt to preserve the peace amongst my favorite bloggers, I’m going to make it up to her, and all our druid friends. I’m going to tell you…

How a Druid Should Attack a Hunter

OMG BRK! You scream. Ya can’t give away our dirty little secrets, or most treasured tricks, and our deep-seated fears. It’s not right! It’s not natural! It’s indwarfane (inhumane for dwarves, right?) and you’ll get a nasty letter from the Happy Hunting Ground Committee on Excellence and Silence.

Pfft.

So, a little mystique shall be revealed… let’s analyze.

Situation Numero Uno

Hunter is standing still, pet at his side. Assuming he’s not AFK, he’s guarding something. His radar is up and he’s watching for humanoid enemies approaching. He has a Freeze Trap at his feet, slightly behind him. He has a Flare up. His pet is on defensive. Since he is tracking humanoids, he cannot track beasts. Go cat/bear form immediately. Really experienced hunters have a macro so that they switch between track humanoid and track beast every 15 seconds or so. Very few hunters actually do this, though. Assume the muffin-head you’re watching doesn’t.

Do not attack from behind. You’ll be trapped, he’ll get to range, and you’re dead.

Do not attack from the front. He’ll see you before you strike, send pet, Scattershot or Intimidation, and same dead druid result.

Attack from the side, and usually the right side is free from pets.

If he has Bestial Wrath, your cat-form doesn’t stand a chance. You must go Bear and hope to outlast his 18 seconds of IWIN Button. If you can survive the Bestial Wrath, you must then keep him in melee range. Entangling Root is great, just don’t use it before Bestial Wrath is up.

Any decent hunter can kite bear-form, so now you switch to cat; you have to kill the hunter as quickly as possible. Watch for Wing Clip and more traps, especially Snake traps. You can use your Alliance/Horde trinket to break free of his Frost trap, but the snakes will drop Crippling Poison on you.

Situation Numero Dos

Hunter is running, pet beside him. He is hunting something or someone, and his pet is on passive. Watch his behavior. He is not dropping traps, he is not dropping Flares. If he is killing Talbuks, he is hunting animals for a quest or grinding money, or whatever. He is therefore tracking beasts. Stay in humanoid form and attack with Nature damage so his mail armor cannot mitigate it. Get as much damage in as possible before you have to go Bear to survive Bestial Wrath, or Cat if he is a Marksman.

Marksman are more deadly in bursts than Beastmasters, especially if you just stand there. A marksman’s burst damage can be tremendous. Allow a Marksman with 2400 RAP to drop an Aimed Shot on you non-Bear, and he will slam a 4000-damage crit faster than you can say, “Elune be praised”. It’ll be over before it’s begun. Go cat-form and get in his grill as fast as you can, remember that Feral Charge is your friend.

Conclusions

Remember the Hunter Dead Zone. Between 3 and 8 yards distance, a Hunter has only two attacks: his pet and Scattershot. If you can Hibernate the pet and Root the Hunter, just sit in this dead zone and blast away with whatever you’ve got.

All hunters will use Concussive Shot to try to get to range. Shift forms to break it.

If you see a hunter casting Fear Beast, shift to humanoid form or be ready to trinket out of the Fear.

If you allow the hunter to get to range, you will die. Period. In my experience, this is true of every class if similarly geared to the hunter.

Cat-form dps out-performs hunter melee damage by a long shot. Bear-form damage mitigation will allow you to survive any melee attacks a hunter can launch. If you can stay in melee range, you will win.

Please keep in mind that BRK does not play a druid. If we messed up a name or talent, we apologize. These tactics are from my personal experience in PvP and dueling druids, and not necessarily the Best Way according to druid experts.

Well Amanna, how’s that?

So you’ve cleared all the trash mobs before the big room where you make a right turn and jump into the sewer. Look at the pic, your next two pulls are the mobs indicated by the two heavy red lines.

Got me so far?

Good. These guys are all bugged. See that thin red line on the picture? None of these mobs can go further than this line. Here’s how to get past this room in a couple of seconds.

Send Sparky, (a rogue, hunter, or someone who can dump aggro), to the front of the party. Have him hug the right wall, stepping on the tables and stuff, and make a mad dash through the mobs guarding the next room, where the drop-down to the sewer is. Your boy Sparky will aggro the entire room and they will charge him…

But they won’t stop him from getting past that red line, and they won’t follow him any further. They will stand at the entrance to that little room… and only the ranged attackers will be able to do any damage to him. If Sparky goes to the top of the sewer drop-down, he’ll be out of line-of-sight and won’t take any damage.

At this point, the rest of the party follows and gets past the red line. All the mobs are still aggro’d on Sparky, so they won’t be aggro’d on the rest of your party as they run past. Your guys run and jump down into the sewer. The hunter Feign’s Death, or the rogue Vanishes, and the mobs all return to their starting positions.

Congratulations, you’ve totally bypassed that room.

My question is, am I the only one who knows this, or is this the standard way people do this room? Every Shattered Halls pug I’ve been in has been amazed at this and has never heard of it. Perhaps BRK found something special here?

The instance itself was pretty easy. Made lots of use of Misdirection and our tank just loved it. I need to do a good blog entry on this fabulous hunter talent, don’t I.

Shadow priest, fire mage, destruction warlock, arms warrior, beastmaster hunter. We made short work of all the trash mobs and killed the first boss basicially ignoring the elemental adds.

The second half of the instance required us to do a little more due to people getting feared into mobs, and a happy-go-lucky tank who wandered a little too far into my Ultimate Zone of Perfect Safety when I Feigned Death to abort a bad pull.

The fear was particularly troubling as I myself was feared once. I don’t like to die, and I really hate getting feared. Fear me? I’ve got your fear right here, baby. Have a little taste of Bestial Wrath and The Beast Within. I’ll even pop Intimidation, Rapid Fire, and a +200 RAP trinket to let you really have some fun. Do you like me and Big Red Kitty’s combined 925 DPS? Guess you can’t answer, ’cause you’re Dead.

Go ahead and try to fear me now, beyotch.
That particular dump of testerone required a cookie to celebrate, so we took a small break before continuing to Talon King Ikiss. When we got to him, we decided to try the ole standby, “run-in-and-see-what-happens” strategy.

Well, Ikiss blinks.
His arcane missles go through stone.
His arcane explosion kills squishies in one shot.

Obviously, we needed a more subtle strategy than, “me smash, you heal”.

What eventually worked was grouping everyone but the tank in the same area on a side of a big pillar. When Ikiss blinked to us, we just ran to the other side of the pillar, which blocked the arcane explosion, and the tank was able to quickly find Ikiss and regain aggro. He dropped two cloth loots and the squishies celebrated.

BRK had been polymorphed once and was justifiably kitty-pissed. He subsequently lifted his hind leg on the splattered body, which was a perfect opportunity for a screenshot.

Oh, BRK just reminded me to say a big BRK Purr of Thanks to the shadow priest who critted a greater healing for 5200 on his soft, furry butt.

First off, BRK has blown through the 6000 cumulative hits barrier; we’ve gone Plaid! There’s a lot more stuff BRK has on his dinner dish, so you can be sure that more content, more information, and more silliness is just around the corner. Man, I’ve got a Tuber Quest post I can’t wait to get up here. Jeebus, this quest both sucks and blows… but I’m giving it away. More on this later

I got to run The Mechanar instance in a pug this weekend. You know how rare it is for a hunter to be “needed”? How could I turn the invitation down? I couldn’t, so I went, even though I typically despise and loathe pugs. How did we do? Finished it, no wipes. No gear for BRK, but that’s typical, too. But specifically, how did Damh and Hobbes do?
Let’s all recite the Hunter Credo, and with feeling this time:

“The main purpose of a Hunter is to provide large, controlled, sustained quantities of ranged-DPS.”

Are you bringing large quantities of controlled and sustained ranged-DPS to your instance runs? Or are you a sheep-breaking, aggro-on-priest-dumping, bad-pulling, add-aggro’ing pain in the patootie?

Next, the Drive For Epic Flight continues at a pace that makes BRK’s head swim with thoughts of a red armored gryphon in the near-future. Money money money, hubba bubba, hubba, who do ya love?

Try being restrained and cautious at the auction house with that bankroll. BRK keeps begging for an Eternium Water Dish, an Embued Netherweave Scratchpost, and a Socketted Collar with some gems that grant +12 Friskiness. That’s gonna be one disappointed cat, let me tell you.

And finally, new gloves with wicked stats are the fashion this weekend. The quest reward for completing the 24th of the 25 quests in the Tempest Keep Key series coughed up this beaut of a blue baubble:

These are good enough to slap a nice enchant upon, mostly thanks to our guild enchanter. She’s d@mn good, but refuses to let me tip her. I’ve covered this issue, and my disgust about it, previously. Why won’t she take my tip? I’m not good enough, my money smells or has cooties? Yes, I send her all my bizarre-o BOE greenies to disenchant, as all good guildies should. But I don’t care, I want to show my apreciation, fer cryin out loud!

What gift can one give a stubborn enchanter? Ideas?

Some words of wisdom from the denizens of the WoW Hunter forums. I wanted to post these as-is to preserve their authenticity, but the grammar and spelling were just too much. So I’ve done some modifications to bring them up to my son’s Pre-K English standards. This is BRK’s blog, and I’m not gonna explain to him why it was assaulted by stuff he wouldn’t leave in his litter box.

I recommend 24-hours of fasting before continuing to read this post. A warm towel, saltines, and a strong Rubbermaid bucket aren’t bad ideas either.

• Beastmaster offers one thing really, 18 seconds of pet immunity.
• Actually, Beastmaster hunters will get owned in arena.
• Beastmasters are only good versus players that don’t know their class.
• Beastmaster hunters are usually alts or people that don’t raid or PvP much.
• If you put that many points in your pet, your hunter must really suck.
• I doubt there are more than three respectable Beastmaster hunters server-wide.
• I seriously have not found a good use for misdirection yet. Wasn’t this skill supposed to make hunters the gods of pulling? It’s a worthless skill.
• I could cast misdirection on the priest, then cast distracting shot, auto shot, arcane shot, and the druid tank will be able to get aggro back with one taunt/mangle, so explain to me how this skill is worth anything?
• Can you explain why almost 100% of the time it’s better for a mage or the tank to pull rather than the hunter? The mage is better off sheep-pulling or the main tank is better off pulling. Or hell the rogue can pull better than a hunter half the time.
• Misdirection is useless and on a two-minute cooldown! You would be like, “Hold up guys, I need my misdirection to cooldown.”
• What’s the final tally for Training Points for a pet at 70? I know it was 300 at 60, what is the 70 total?
• Beastmaster is EZ mode. It’s a two-minute win spec and all you do is pop intimidation with a warp stalker, have them warp in, then pop Beastial Wrath and bam they’re dead.

• Original Poster (level 15): Need a build reviewed, post it here.
• Next Poster: Then why not post on one of your mains? Not trying to flame, but if I’m going to post my build for you to review, I want to make sure you’re not just some level 15 lowbie.
• OP: Because my main account got banned from the forums for trolling mages over two years ago.

The wildly funny author of Crystalis, the Lovable Warlock was generous enough to stop by BRK and leave us with some words so concise and adroit that they deserve their own mini-post:

“Hunters as a group seem to have a greater skill disparity than any other class in WoW. A poor hunter is probably the single worst teammate you could have, whereas an excellent hunter is one of the best.”

There ya go fellas, don’t say I didn’t warn you. I’m kinda disappointed he didn’t make an educated guess where he thinks the most hunters would be classified…

Now then, I gotta inspect the blog for anything that Warlock might have left behind. Don’t need anything from the Demon Dimension hiding under the sofa, ya know what I’m saying?

(Picture used without written permission, but if Crystalis objects, I shall remove it post-haste. I don’t wanna be banished; I’m sure it’s cold there.)

The act of Pulling we can define as: A technique used to maneuver a mob into a strategically preferable position in order to maximize the success of an Attack.

Pulling is a precursor to battle, not the battle itself. When a hunter sends his pet, waits for it to grab aggro, then kills the target from range, it is not a Pull; it is an Attack. Whereas a battle is begun to inflict damage upon the enemy, a pull is begun to control the enemy. But what are we trying to control?

With a Pull, we wish to direct the flow of the battle and to determine where the battle takes place. We can call this Positioning.

We also wish to minimize the number of enemies that are affected by our Pull. We can call this Damage Effect.

Finally, we wish to expose the fewest number of people to the hazards of a bad Pull and minimize the amount of time they are within this range. We can call this Exposure.

Positioning - “We want to fight the mob here,” is a good example of positioning. Getting a mob into a desired position requires grabbing its attention, or aggro’ing it, then moving its aggro target where we want the mob to go.

If a Priest runs to a mob, hits it with her staff, then runs to another position, this is a pull. It is not a particularly good Pull because the Priest may not survive the initial attack that occurs once she has aggro’d the mob. Also, because she’s being attacked, she may not be able to get to the place where she wants the mob.

Obviously, a ranged attack is the best option for a Pull as it does not put the puller at immediate risk. The further away the puller is from his target, the more time between aggro gain and potential combat, and the greatest range and chance for success of Positioning.

Which class has the greatest ranged attack?

Damage Effect - All damage causes Damage Effect (DE). When a single arrow hits a mob, it has a DE; all mobs that are within the radius of the arrow’s DE will target the source of that arrow. The more damage the arrow does, that larger its DE; an attack that causes 2000 damage will have a larger DE than one that causes 400 damage.

In order to Position a single mob when it is one among many, one must create the smallest DE possible in order not to pull all the mobs. Therefore, we want to do a very small and controlled amount of damage.

Which class has the greatest capability to deliver very small quantities of controlled damage from the greatest range?

Exposure - When performing a Pull, things can and do go wrong. Patrols, linked mobs, bugged instances, and human error can cause many more mobs to aggro on the Pull than was wanted. If too many mobs, or specific mobs you are incapable of handling, aggro the party, a wipe is the usual outcome.

One method of limiting the Exposure of the party to accidental aggro can be accomplished by removing the party from the aggro radius of the puller. If a mage runs fifty yards ahead of the party, attacks a group of mobs and dies, the rest of the party will not be attacked; you have limited the party’s Exposure. But this doesn’t really help the party either, as the mage is now dead. Surviving intentional and accidental aggro is also key to Exposure.

What would be preferred would be for the puller to have the capability to eliminate all accidental aggro in the event of a bad pull. When the party doesn’t die from accidental aggro, and the puller doesn’t die from accidental aggro, you could define it as The Perfect Zone of Ultimate Safety.

Which class has the greatest capability to deliver very small quantities of damage from the greatest range and create The Perfect Zone of Ultimate Safety?

The Hunter does. /clap

Not only does the hunter have all these basic tenets of pulling, but he has a variety of methods of implementing them:

The Solo Pull Shot - This is the basic low-damage pull shot technique. One may chose it in order to Maneuver a single mob from a group without aggro’ing the others, or one may desire simply to do the least amount of damage in order for a class more capable of holding it in Position to take over once the Pull is complete. And yes, it involves a macro:

/cast Arcane Shot(Rank 1)
/stopcasting
/cast Hunter’s Mark

Arcane Shot is an instant cast. Even if you have a maximum ranged attack of 46 yards, you must still put yourself in harm’s way by approaching the mobs. Thus, we minimize the time we are Exposed to the mobs by using an instant attack, Arcane Shot.

When we cast Arcane Shot, the mechanics of the game cause our Auto Shot to commence. In order to do as little damage, and thus minimize our DE and maximize the capability of a tanking class to take the mob’s aggro from us, we select the least-powerful Arcane Shot we have, Rank 1.

Finally, as a bonus, we cast Hunter’s mark so that we identify the target we have pulled. Also, if the hunter is spec’d for Improved Hunter’s Mark, we increase the Attack Power of people who will melee and range-attack the mob. Notice that we did not Hunter’s Mark the target before casting Arcane Shot. If we had Hunter’s Marked before firing Arcane Shot, we would have increased our own Ranged Attack Power and caused more damage, increasing our DE and the likelihood of a bad pull.

Line of Sight Pull - There are mobs who do not melee, but instead attack with spells. We call them “casters”. As they have a ranged attack, they will not run toward you if you hit them with your Pull Shot, but will instead begin casting their spells. In order to Position a caster mob, you can use a Line of Sight Pull.

Just like every other ranged class, you must be within the range and the line of sight of the caster mob for him to attack you. If you can remove yourself from his line of sight, he will stop casting and run toward you to get you back in his line of sight.

The Line of Sight Pull requires you to attack with your pull shot, then maneuver yourself so that you are out of the caster’s line of sight. He will run toward you and, when he is in the proper Position, you can pop out and send your pet or allow another class to grab aggro, and attack from range.

Pet Pull - Sometimes the mob will be located such that you can see and target him, but cannot fire at him. Terrain like rocks, hills, and slopes, buildings, walls, and stairs can prevent you from firing at a mob you can plainly see.

If you are in a party with a tank class, turn off your pet’s attacks and send your pet to attack the mob. Immediately after the mob aggro’s your pet - and this could happen even before the pet lands a hit - recall your pet. The mob will follow your pet, and since your pet is returning to you, you should maneuver yourself so that your tank can easily grab aggro from your pet.

If you are soloing, or if your pet is the main tank, leave the attacks and growl on as additional aggro is preferred.

One major sticking point to the Pet Pull is that the pet will use the path-of-least-pet-resistance to get to the mob he is attacking. He will not jump up or down, but will take stairs, ramps, and other indirect paths to his target. This could spell disaster if his path intersects with other mobs. You must take great care to ensure that your pet does not aggro additional mobs when he is away from your side.

Feign Death Pull - This is an aggro-management pull. There are certain mobs that are linked; you cannot pull one without all the others. However, this only applies to the initial aggro gain, not any subsequent aggro gain before the mobs reset. If you’ve been in the Alterac Valley battleground, you probably know that the Horde’s Warmasters operate on this principal; you cannot pull one without pulling them all using the previously discussed techniques.

If you are presented with a group of linked mobs and wish to separate one from that pack, bring your tank buddy with you to maximum range from the closest mob. Target that mob and use your Pull Shot. All the mobs will aggro and run toward you. As soon as the closest mob is within your tanks attack radius, Feign Death. At that instant, the tank must attempt to gain the aggro of the closest mob, either by attacking or using a Shout. The other mobs, if they are not aggro’d by the tank, will return to their starting positions and reset while the tank continues the Pull and Positions the mob where the rest of the party can attack it. At this point, you can pop back up and assist in the attack.

The Feign Death Pull can also be accomplished without a tank by using your pet. And yes, it certainly helps to have a macro:

/targetlasttarget
/petattack

When you Feign Death, your target is cleared. It’s necessary to reacquire it before your pet can attempt to grab aggro, thus the /targetlasttarget command. Once we reacquire the target, we tell our pet to attack the mob using the /petattack command. Pop back up, move to where you want to Position the mob, recall your pet, the mob will follow, resend your pet to attack and you can commence attacking from range.

The Trap Pull - Used primarily against patrols and wandering mobs, it has a much larger DE than an Arcane Shot (Rank 1). However, it works wonderfully as a variation of the Line of Sight Pull against both caster and melee mobs.

Place an Immolation Trap in the path of a wandering mob and maneuver yourself to where you wish to fight it, around a corner or up a flight of stairs for example. When the mob hits the trap, it will aggro the person who laid the trap; you. It will have a larger amount of aggro than if you had hit it with an Arcane Shot (Rank 1), but nothing your pet cannot pull off of you.

Conclusion - Not so long ago, a very good warrior - someone who has more WoW experience and knowledge than anybody I know - was pulling mobs in a 5-man instance and exclaimed, “Hey, I really should be letting the hunter pull. I do read Big Red Kitty, you know.” Of course, it was said mockingly.

And, off course, you know what happened next… he made a bad pull. With his Blastershot Launcher, he caused enough damage to his target that he aggro’d the Boss and his two lieutenants in addition to all the mobs that he had wanted to pull. His solution to the mess? Exclaim, “Oh Sh*t”.

We didn’t die, in no small part due to the fact that he is an amazing tank and aggro gatherer, plus the party was way overpowered for the instance, and we had a simply amazing Healadin taking great care of us…

But Let Hunters Pull FTW!