Hunters Need To Know

Yes, I actually bought a fraps license and figured out what was wrong with my microphone boost.  All this to bring you a YouTube video describing my new NeedToKnow setup!  My bars show the uptime of our spells and the remaining CD all in one bar.  They're not complete; Call them a first draft.  But they are pretty important.  In order to have competitive damage numbers you need to use new MoP/5.0 hunter abilities mixed in with the old.

Black Arrow N2K Import String:

bv1:{VOn=true,Typ=CASTCD,sIc=true,TF=Fmt_Float,Clr={r=0.80392156862745,g=0,b=0.88235294117647},VCl={a=0.30000001192093,b=0.89019607843137,g=0.87843137254902,r=0.77254901960784},BCl={a=0},Aura=Black Arrow,VEx="4"}

Dire Beast N2K Import String:

bv1:{VOn=true,Typ=CASTCD,Aura=Dire Beast,sIc=true,TF=Fmt_Float,Clr={r=0,g=0.43921568627451,b=0.78823529411765},BCl={a=0,b=0.88627450980392,g=0.85490196078431,r=0.90196078431373},sCt=false,VEx="15"}

A Murder of Crows Import String:

bv1:{VOn=true,Aura=A Murder of Crows,sIc=true,TF=Fmt_Float,Clr={b=0.87450980392157,g=0,r=0.43137254901961},VCl={a=0.30000001192093,b=0.78823529411765,g=0.77647058823529,r=0.75686274509804},BCl={a=0},sCt=false,Typ=CASTCD,VEx="90"}

Hunter DPS Pro Tip #2: Information is Power You Need to Know

Take four minutes of your busy in-wow time and visit a target dummy.  Do this if you're a novice.  Do this if you're advanced.  Plow damage on the poor wooden thing.  While you're doing that, look at the things you don't normally look at on your screen.  Check your proc'd buffs.  Watch your timers.  Look at your key-presses.  See if your UI is showing you what you need to see and if it's pushing away the junk you don't need to see.

I bet in those four minutes you will find something you want to change -- and it will improve your play.

It might be getting a mod that alerts you to a proc.  I used to use Power Auras but I fell out of love with it.  I want to know the precise duration for a proc and sometimes even the internal timer for it to be available again.  I like a nice visible progress bar, so I use NeedToKnow.

When I visit a target dummy I am there to add something.  I always end up tweaking something else. Sometimes I remove something.  Too much information can be worse than too little.  Your brain starts filtering out stuff and you fail to notice important things.  Changing colors of UI components can help.  Making small macros.  Moving things around.

JS' Hunter Bar a.k.a Serenity

And there's also the opportunity to try new mods out.  Since I know your time is limited I'll only recommend one addon you may not have heard about: JS' Hunter Bar which is now re-written as Serenity.  It presents a focus bar with color shifting levels, shot availability, stings, CC timers, hunter mark status, and if something targeted needs tranq shotting.  I really have to say that it is quite powerful, well-organized, compact and doesn't tell you more than you need.  I use it in conjunction with a few NeedToKnow timers.

You Are Not Prepared: Hunter 4.0 Specs, Glyphs, Pet Changes, Spells, Macros, Shot Priorities

Time to re-learn the hunter game!  I've been trying to get onto the PTR since it opened.  My loader just didn't want to keep downloading.  It died frequently and only got about 1/3rd of the PTR down.  This was almost enough to load screens, but nowhere near close enough to play.

I've been spending most of my hunter time collecting acheesements (hero, did it years ago, pacman, master wg,  74 mnts incl. a hog, a whole bunch o pets, and not quite insane 36 rep incl. fur love).

I've also been preparing for tomorrow.  I prepped myself by getting every Glyph that exists today (including some that will be junk tomorrow).  I bought out a few AH markets that may be blossoming tomorrow.

All that said, I don't know the ideal spec.  I don't know how much I'm going to re-forge or into what.  I don't know the best glyphs to use, best shot selection or even my UI and macros.  It's all changing.

Here's the thing though:  It's okay.  In the next month, we'll work it all out.  But most likely nobody really cares about level 80... least of all Blizzard.  They are only balancing and tweaking things for level 85.  I mean, SV and BM don't even have access to cobra shot (the non-Marksman version of steady shot).

Everyone's UI is going to suck. Auction addons will be broken.  Macros will need to be stripped down and re-built from scratch.  It's all okay.  I'm not even overly concerned that my uber armor pen gems will become crit gems.  I may just reforge other crit and might even switch to SV for a while.

But I'll be keeping my eye on what works, playing with test dummies and showing off what I'm using. I really love all the specs.  To me: BM is like sittin on the floor givin your pet a good scritchin'.  MM is all about the ranged weapon and headshots.  SV is like dancing with your enemies and blasting them to bits.

Multi-tracking

MMO Champion has a brief mention which has me quite intrigued. It reads, "Last but not least, the Minimap now allow you to track multiple things at once! Hurray!"

As someone with mining as a lame-ass skill (Yeah, OMG, he has mining as a skill?!?)  This change is a godsend if I can use it and track DPS targets at the same time.  Generally these days, I don't use mining for anything.  I'm waiting to see how buff other trade skills will be in the expansion.

On The Road To Being a Marksman - Part 5

I'm playing the marksman tree with arcane shot. At least until I get my armor penetration up. This means I need to have a lot of keybinds. I generally only put spell abilities on my number keys. With Survival, I made accommodations for space by using clever macros with multiple casts or castsequences. I also desire to not have the layout be significantly different than my Survival layout. So I am painted in as far as the number of slots I have and what I can do with them.

This is my Steady Shot Meat-n-Potatoes Macro. I might be casting Steady when I'm just grinding around or when I'm conserving mana. I don't need to add a lot of stuff with long cooldowns or mana-draining abilities here. I don't let it complain if KC or Howl aren't available yet. (No worries!)

#showtooltip Steady Shot
/console Sound_EnableSFX 0
/cast [target=pettarget,exists] Kill Command
/cast Furious Howl
/console Sound_EnableSFX 1
/cast !Auto Shot /cast Steady Shot
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()

This is my new "What the heck is Arcane Shot?!?" macro. Nothing special to say except that if I'm tossing in Arcane shots then I have mana to spare and I want DPS up. So I also toss a Silencing Shot if it is available. This isn't great for PvP ... unless you're only dueling.

#showtooltip Arcane Shot
/console Sound_EnableSFX 0
/cast Silencing Shot
/console Sound_EnableSFX 1
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()
/cast Arcane Shot

This is my similarly-made Aimed shot macro. Same disclaimers as Arcane shot as far as use and use in PvP.

#showtooltip Aimed Shot
/console Sound_EnableSFX 0
/cast Silencing Shot
/console Sound_EnableSFX 1
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()
/cast Aimed Shot

It's sad to say, but I never had Call of the Wild macro'd before. I ... *gasp* had it on Auto. Well, now that I have a bunch of gear procs I do have a decent reason to lay it all on. I also give myself a little reminder to do it all again when my load is spent. I think that's kinda cool. And I need the reminder. Unfortunately heroic instance bosses don't usually last more than 15 seconds so I haven't had much use for it yet.

#showtooltip
/cast Rapid Fire
/cast Call of the Wild
/in 15 /w Kheldul BLOW IT ALL -then- READINESS

Here's my initial sting button. I don't really know if the Howl benefits the sting. But I'm certainly not going to put in a /in 1 before casting the sting. You want to sting multiple targets, right? Oh, and I do have Bite on Autocast. That said if I happened to have him sitting around this would make him leap into the fray. And the sting is usually the first shot. IFF I wanted him to stay by my side, then I have to hit the sting and control-2 him back. So, you might want to remove that whole section.

#showtooltip Serpent Sting
/cast Furious Howl
/cast Serpent Sting
/use [@pettarget,harm,exists] Bite
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tips and Tricks Roundup

I hope you enjoyed my not-so-typical hunter DPS tips. They were mostly about behavior and excluded any talk of gear, enchants, gems, glyphs, flasks, or even shot selection specific to a hunter talent tree. Don't worry - This is not a going out of business sale!

Here's the round-up.

Tip #1: Maximize Yer Powerhouse Cooldowns


Tip #2: Use That In-Combat Pot


Tip #3: Don't Cheap Out


Tip #4: Buff That Pet!


Tip #5: Time on Target and Movement


Tip #6: Pre-Combat Pottin'


Tip #7: Network Latency


Tip #8: Low FPS FTL


Tip #9: Strategies and Situational Awareness


Tip #10: Minimize the Viper


Tip #11: Pet Time on Target


Tip #12: Maur DoTs!


Tip #14: Go Forth and Multiply


Tip #15: Be a Leech


Tip #16: Kill It Dead


Tip #17: Small Pauses Aren't Always Bad


Tip #18: Mind Your Peripherals


Tip #19: DPS for Dummies


Tip #20: A Room With a View


Tip #21: Macros and Saving Steps


Tip #22: The Skin Is Always Greener


Tip #23: KISS


Tip #24: Taking a Metered Approach


Tip #25: Timing Autoshot


Tip #26: Pet Auto-Casts


Tip #27: See What You Need

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tip #27: See What You Need

Tip #27: See What You Need
So much attention has been spent to good UIs. There's a reason. You don't want too much information. You need some of it summarized and some of it in your face. You can't have too much or you'll tune it out -- and maybe tune out too much. And if you don't tune it out, it will delay your other thought processes. You need screen real estate. You need good addons. You need to try out the features of the UI you make so that it works for you.
Do you need numbers spiraling out at you? Do you need to know who healed your pet? Do you need numbers counting down the milliseconds before the graphical bar shows it is complete? Do you need to see your pet casts? Do you need a timer bar for your Blessing of Kings buff? Think about what you need to remove from your UI as much as what you need to add to your UI.

After you boiled down what you need and don't need, make sure to have space to see what is going on around your character. Clutter is not your friend. If you're using Power Auras, don't make them so they obscure your general vicinity. (Power Auras is a great visual space-saver, but only use it for what is important!) Cast bars can be thinned. Keep what you need to look at front and center. Keep things that you scan quickly to the left and right. Humans, like other animals, grew up in the landscape world and have eyes horizontally aligned. We'll see changes and horizontal movement a lot quicker than a vertical change.

There is a thread over at Elitist Jerks with over a 100 hunter UI screenshots. Check it out for ideas.

I recommend Power Auras for the important stuff; Need to Know for the important procs and target debuffs; and Mike's Combat Scrolling Text to keep the information flow reduced and flowing out of the way. And of course everyone recommends something like Deadly Boss Mods and something for combat stats. There's also help for auto-shot visualization, and viper alarms.

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tip #25: Timing Autoshot

Tip #25: Timing Autoshot
When someone talks about a hunter's Autoshot, they are usually complaining about the hunter not putting out enough damage. They are alluding to the fact that that hunter is just sitting back and letting their version of a swing timer do the work. And it's usually not working too well. Well, let me tell you that Autoshot is an important component to your DPS. Yes, it is not usually something easy to study. The problem is that Autoshot doesn't occur while you're moving. It's true that everyone needs to move. It's also true that every hunter worth their salt tries to not move as much as possible. Well, there's a tiny little gray zone in there.

Autoshot fires off at the end of the autoshot timer. This is the same as the "swing timer" for other classes. It will not fire if you are moving. It also will not start a new timer if it hasn't fired. So it is important to know/see/hear when your autoshot fire and get it into a rhythm. You want to stop moving or not move or very very briefly stop moving when your autoshot needs to fire.

If you allow more autoshots to fire, you have more shots fired, and will do more damage.

The tiny picture above shows my autoshot crutch. I use an addon that visually displays my a narrow autoshot timer above my normal spell timer. The addon I use is AzCastBar with the swingtimer plugin. It's a large package that can take a while to set up, so give yourself a good 20 minutes to try it out.

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tip #21: Macros and Saving Steps

Tip #21: Macros and Saving Steps
For any keyboard operations you do, are there any of them that are multi-step and always the same? Do they deserve a spot on your keyboard bindings, or is something more deserving? If they are multi-step and multi-button clicks, then consider making them into macros. One button press is much better than two. For any mouse-click operations, are there any multi-step multi-button or multi-target abilities you click? Just because you may choose to be "a clicker" doesn't mean you have to click like nuts. Reduce the number of clicks.

For example, Misdirect can be a small or large DPS loss for a hunter. If in the middle of a battle you need to click MD, and then move over and click a tank, and then click or press some damage shots then you have room to improve your DPS downtime with a Misdirect macro. Do you have a ton of buttons tied up for melee attacks? Reduce them to one melee macro. Do you tab-target to an enraged mob and tranq shot them, or do you stay on your DPS target and toss a /cast [target=mouseover,exists] Tranquilizing Shot mouse-over on them? If you manually click Kill Command, you have room to improve your DPS with a macro:

#showtooltip Steady Shot
/console Sound_EnableSFX 0
/cast [target=pettarget,exists] Kill Command
/console Sound_EnableSFX 1
/cast !Auto Shot
/cast Steady Shot
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()

Do you put your pet DPS specials on auto-attack? Or are they macroed too? Not only will you save steps, time and thought cycles, but you'll open up more important slots on your button bar.

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tip #20: A Room With a View

Tip #20: A Room With a View
Zoom out. Hunters don't do well with a first-person-shooter view. Go isometric and zoom out at a 45 degree angle. It often helps you see more of the fight area by zooming out even further (this requires a little more computer power):

/console cameraDistanceMaxFactor 4

If you have a job to do pivot your perspective without pivoting your character. You can also get a top-down view if you need to ... say run around and gobble up orbs of your color in ToC. And if you're resistant to using a /range display then you can more easily eye-ball the distance between you and your control-V'ed neighbor.

You can also use it in Anub's room, pivoted down and see the frost orbs by looking down instead of looking up.

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tip #10: Minimize the Viper

Tip 10: Minimize the Viper
Everyone knows that the less time you're in Aspect of the Viper, the better your DPS will be. Some people like to pop a speed or rapid fire when they're in viper so they get out of it sooner. I won't argue that point, but I don't do it myself.

I will tell you that you should get an addon to flash in your face if you're in viper and at full health. It should say "hey idiot, flip to dragonhawk". I haven't found one that says that to you, but they should make one.

The other thing I will advise you on is that if the boss is below 50% health then you shouldn't need to viper your mana back to full. It's a crying shame if you do it. If you used all your mana in getting the boss down to 40%, then you don't need to use all your mana again to get the boss down to -20% health. Do a quick calculation and only mana-up to what you think you'll need.

There are also other ways to keep your mana up if you're not getting enough replenishment or wisdom judgments. You can flip to viper when there is an idle time or if you're out of range. But even easier, you can and should toss a viper sting on a mana boss or minion that you're not DPS'ng. They buffed that sting a while ago. Be a mana leech!

Finally, if you're shooting anything other than steady shot and autoshot while in viper aspect, you're doing it all wrong. Pop out of viper if you need to slam a big shot. Don't stay in viper and use that mana on a half-powered shot. You'll do very little damage, use more mana, and end up in viper longer for no benefit.

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tip #9: Strategies and Situational Awareness

Tip 9: Strategies and Situational Awareness
I find that any time I walk into a particular boss fight that I've never actually fought before my DPS is notably lower than the second time I'm there. This is because I am being careful and trying to do the right thing much more than trying to do the right thing and crank out my top DPS. This is sober. This is sane. I almost always have watched a video or read a strategy of a fight before I've "been there". If you don't do those things, you will likely have miserable DPS, die, or cause a wipe. The other thing here is that once you really understand the strategy then you can optimize your movements, actions, shot decisions, and cooldown use. More specifically, you'll know if it is beneficial to move or not and if it's detrimental not to move. You'll know if you should refresh DoTs before Ony takes off or hold your big attacks and cooldowns one second until Icehowl slams his head against a wall or until you get empowered on the Twin Val'kyr.

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tip #8: Low FPS FTL

Tip 8: Low FPS FTL
When raid AoE starts crashing in if your Frames Per Second fall to single digits most likely your computer needs some upgrading. Anything under 30FPS is probably going to affect your DPS -- from minor, to major, to severe. Most raiders will be getting 60FPS. 60FPS is a high quality video on the internet. 30FPS is a standard quality video. You can think of numbers below 29.875 as degraded. Often sound doesn't synchronize with the video. If you are getting 30FPS you probably need to have your enhanced video settings (dimensions, shadows, spell effects, etc) turned down. Maybe you already do. Spell effects are important. Make sure your setting allows you to see the fire you are standing in. The color and effects of the fire vary all the time. So does the floor color. Experiment. Seek guild advice. Don't run in windowed mode. That will lower your FPS. Don't run in max resolution. Knock it down for a speeder response.

If you have adjusted your video settings and you're still below 30 while in an active raid, then you can use this completely made up rule of thumb to see your DPS penalty: for every 3 FPS below 30, you will be doing 10% less damage than if you were at or above 30. When you're at 0 FPS you'll be at zero DPS. Okay, maybe that heuristic is crap, but you get the idea.

If you are still out of luck with tuning settings down, ask a knowledable person what you should upgrade on your computer. It could even potentially be a bad router, hub, or faulty NIC. But generally, you'll want to upgrade your computer RAM, video card, and CPU in that order of priority.

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tip #7: Network Latency

Tip 7: Network Latency
Do you usually have high network latency? Do you live in Australia and have your server in California? Do you work in Iraq or Afghanistan and raid in New Jersey? Do you have a crappy internet provider? Or is it just temporary? The Australia connection can be dealt with to some degree. You can use quartz and stop-casting-pre-cast. You can focus more on DoT and channeled casts. You can hit things a little earlier and switch targets a little sooner. You will suffer a DPS penalty, but it doesn't need to be tremendous. If you're in Iraq and coming in via satellite with two second latency, you can ... solo. If you are like me and have a 300ms latency cross-country then you will basically just be taking a 50-100dps penalty. Not a big deal. If you have crappy internet then you should scream and shout. If you are red-lined and not normally, then check for background downloads (virus definitions, windows updates, podcasts, etc.) on your computer and your housemates.

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tip #6: Pre-Combat Pottin'

Tip 6: Pre-Combat Pottin'
For a crazy extra little umph, quaff a pot just before combat begins. You won't get the combat pot debuff, just the normal potion cooldown. I recommend this only for hard-modes where you have a good plan. You don't want to use it on any boss with a in-combat pulse but a long speech before anyone can attack. And you want to let people know you're doing it (they might be impressed!) so that the potion isn't completely wasted before the actual combat engagement.

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tip #5: Time on Target and Movement

Tip 5: Time on Target and Movement
You do need to move. You don't need to continue moving. Figure out how to move less and spend less time doing it. Be quick to keep your target in range. Use disengage to move left and right instead of just backward. You can disengage between autoshots and other cooldowns. Consider the movement enchant instead of icewalker for your boots if you don't need the hit. Stutter step so you let your auto-shots fire. Get an addon to help visualize your autoshot timer. If you use wowwebstats.com, challenge yourself to increase your "DPS Time" in boss fights.

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tip #4: Buff That Pet!

Tip 4: Buff That Pet!
Get a truckload of the pet food buffs. Even the bad stuff is better than nothing. Use them when you eat. Walking around with an unbuffed pet makes them slightly more squishy. Think of an un-strength-buffed pet as a negative to your DPS. All the calculators assume your pal is bee-you-eff-eff'd. Don't make Fluffy sad.

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tip #3: Don't Cheap Out

Tip 3: Don't Cheap Out
Use the best ammo you can. Never shoot cheap arrows. I shoot vendor lvl 70s for most occasions. These are usually more expensive than the better ones. But they are in infinite supply. Always try to shoot razorheads/mammoth-cutters for every raid. Don't be that hunter.

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tip #2: Use That In-Combat Pot

Tip 2: Use That In-Combat Pot
Use a potion after the boss is down below 50%. Unless you've got some dead healers and/or no health stone, make sure that a dps potion gets used. I use a speed potion. I find that mana potions rarely give me enough to skip a viper if viper is needed. I have heard that a wild magic potion is good too. These potions are not very expensive so it isn't a big deal to use them on each boss you think you'll down. Think of them as your own mini-heroism/bloodlust button.

Kheldul's Hunter DPS Tip #1: Maximize Yer Powerhouse Cooldowns

Tip 1: Maximize Yer Powerhouse Cooldowns
You need to know when you can go nuts on DPS and how to be able to go nuts more than just once or twice in a raid. If you've got on use trinkets, know when you'll get full use of them. Understand if you use them now how many times you'll be able to use them in the fight. Balance it with knowing that delaying for the best opportunity may mean you may only use them twice instead of three times in a fight. I don't currently use on use trinkets in PvE. But if I did, I'd know that a 2min cooldown with a 30sec active time means you can use it three times in a five minute fight for a total of 1.5 minutes uptime. Your first use can be at time increment zero, not two minutes. The same thing applies to things like Rapid Fire. If you are untalented in it and your kill time for a boss is in the six minute range, then using it early can leave it available again when you often need to pour on the damage. If you upload your combat logs to a place like worldoflogs.com then you'll be able to see your dps over time. You want to see more than one or two spikes! If you have trouble watching for these cooldowns, get a cooldown timer addon like AzCastBar (with the cooldown plugin).