lundi 7 novembre 2011

Marksmanship Soloing Guide: part 1 - Hunter Talents

Hello.
People have started asking me about a guide to soloing. As I never play BM, I will only be able to help you for the marksmanship part.

Now, Marksmanship offers the best hunter survival, good pet survival (though BM pets have lesser  cooldowns on their abilities) and great versatility thanks to readiness.  The long rotation also allows you to use misdirection and mend pet to avoid without loosing too much dps.

All- Around talent build, made to solo a maximum of bosses.
http://us.battle.net/wow/en/tool/talent-calculator#Yc01!Ygg!SekdkebQgd!j!ZYfRklN
This build features all marksmanship talents except 3 (see below), the necessary spirit bond and the +15% stamina.

Other interesting talents:
Marksmanship: Concussive Barrage: used in conjunction with bombardment to kite multiple adds (example: Freya's detonating lashers).
Resistance is futile: extremely low dps gain (bosses hardly move), but still better than bombardment in a no-multiple-adds fight.
Marked for death: nearly worthless

BM: improved mend pet: necessary for some bosses (maexxna, iron council...). However, it forces you to lose 10% stamina.

SV: Pathing if you don't have trouble surviving but have trouble beating the enrage timer.

For those who ask themselves the question, Spirit bond is far more important than hunter vs wild.

Glyphs: Steady shot because it's often used, chimera shot to maximise hunter survival and arcane shot because hardcasting aimed shot is hard when you must use other abilities like tranqshot, feign death, mend pet, misdirection...

Mending and Misdirection are required. Then, it's free choice. I personally ue disengage because I use it often.

The feign death glyph is the only important minor one.


Rotation: standard marksmanship rotation using arcane shot. However, you must also use mend pet and lots of other abilities, while trying to maintain improved steady shot.

Problem: do not use a rotation where mend pet is followed by chimera shot: the cooldown and the HoT will end at the same time, making you lose the benefit of the glyph. If survival isn't an issue, but your pet can't afford a second without mend pet once in a while, you can simply change glyphs and the problem is solved. Or lose a little dps.

To be continued...