29May

Blissfully Bonded with Your Spec

Yesterday Pike of Aspect of the Hare made a post that caught my attention. In “Feelin’ it: A Manifesto“, she describes one very interesting way to decide which spec to choose as a hunter. In her advice, Pike says:

Close your eyes for a moment, forget the world around you, forget your day job or your classes at school and feel that you are a hunter. What does that mean to you?

The goal, from what I can tell, is to pick the spec that suits to your perception of that class best. For example, if you envision a hunter as being intimately tied her to animal companion and benefitting from the synergy that the two share, it should make sense for you to pick Beast Mastery. If, on the other hand, you envision a hunter as wirey and agile, capable of using her knowledge of the terrain and her opponents to survive, Survival is the best of the three for you! Finally, a Marksmanship hunter would most likely be the one interested in the intricacies of being a hunter; she’s meticulous, skilled, and extremely precise.

Aside from how unusual this may sound to some people, I was actually drawn to the post because I used the same methodology in selecting my hunter’s spec years ago when I first rolled her on Feathermoon. As a roleplayer, I have very clearly defined personalities for each of my girls tumbling about in my head and their conduct in-game is heavily influenced by that perception. For example, my perky priestess Csilla is the middle child of seven. As neither the youngest nor the oldest, the brightest nor the dumbest, she didn’t get an overwhelming amount of attention in her youth; as a result, her driving goal in life is to be noticed — mainly by selfishly¹ helping others as frequently as she can so that she can feel needed or important. In-game, this translated into being a healing priest, because — as she’s wont to say — them healer fellahs, they’s always needed!

My kal’dorei huntress is much of the same. Having spent her initial five centuries of life living in the forests of Ashenvale in almost total isolation, Eszti has an almost feral quality to her. While not lacking in basic social necessities, she’s always had this feeling that she doesn’t really belong well in the company of others. She’s aloof, feral, and tends to move with a coiled readiness — when she’s not moving in her traditional loping gait. Therefore, it just made sense for her to be a Beast Master, even if it was at a time when the tree was considered ill-suited for anything outside of the Battlegrounds.

Furthermore, Eszti has the habit of trying to relate normal, everyday things to her perception as, well, a creature of the wild. For example, she considers her friends and guildmates² a natural extension of her pack. As the uncontested alpha female, she takes her repsonsbilities to her pack extremely seriously; it’s not unheard of for her to react with surprising ferocity when a member of her pack is in imminent harm. This has made her very adept at combat, especially back in those days when my friends and I used to roam around Azeroth perma-flagged.

Ask the level 60 mage who attacked Eszti, her lover, and his childhood friend while exploring the Eastern Plaguelands. The Forsaken tried to pick Mcdowl off while he was separated from the group³. When Eszti and Tanriel appeared to aid him, the cowardly mage mounted and fled. While Tanriel rushed to Mcdowl’s side to care for his injuries, Eszti took off after the mage — on foot, having switched to Aspect of the Cheetah⁴. She then proceeded to destroy him single-handedly, using Concussive Shot and Wing Clip to slow him enough to keep him in range while the screeching bird eviscerated him with his claws and she let loose with her arrows.

There’s a reason why her nickname is “Iron Legs” and it isn’t just because she has legs that would put Tina Turner to shame.

However, as I noted in “An Owl is an Owl,” Eszti’s relationship with her animal companion is not that of many hunters you may see in-game. She and Alatus aren’t the type to curl up together around a fire in the evenings or play games; the two are in constant in competition to see who will finally settle out on top and they frequently test the boundaries of their relationship. While Eszti may be aloof yet polite, Alatus is prone to nipping people, disobeying commands, and glaring dolefully at those around him. Despite this added dynamic, the kal’dorei and the bird work extremely well together and are boon companions.

Thanks again, miss Pike, for the insight. While I remain Beast Mastery now due to the amount of damage it does and how it suits my playstyle, it was nice to remember again those carefree and innocent days when I first was exploring the hunter class.

And, yes, that’s selfishly, not selflessly ↩
When she had them, bleh ↩
He may have been picking a flower or something else very un-warlocky at the time ↩
To make matters worse, I even had Pathfinding at the time ↩

3May

The Art of Trapping

Hunter

No comments.

While I enjoy topping damage meters and watching the bird claw out my opponent’s face, that really doesn’t appeal to me all too much. To be honest, raiding as a hunter can be exceedingly dull sometimes. Instead, I enjoyed five-mans, where I am often required to do other tasks, such as use my pet for crowd control and helping the tank establish aggro (Intimidation is divine), kite, or - my personal favorite - trapping.

Fortunately, with the new new raids released in The Burning Crusade, the role of a hunter has expanded beyond maximizing damage (as with many other classes). Many of the raids require that hunters perform the much-loved task of aiding in crowd control by trapping.

I like trapping. A lot. And so I am happy.

With this is mind, I thought that it would be fun to share some of my hints, tips, and tricks for trapping successfully.

Number 1: Trap Early

Prior to most pulls in most instances, a hunter should place her trap down before she is even told that she will be trapping. The reason for this is quite simple: the Freezing Trap lasts for 20 seconds (26 with talents), but has a 30 seconds cooldown (26 with the two-piece Beast Lord set bonus). Placing a trap down before a pull and waiting at least 30 seconds allows you more opportunity to lay down traps later — or provides you with the opportunity to lay another trap down immediately if the first is resisted.

Number 2: Trap Away from the Main Group.

The most annoying thing — for hunters and tanks alike — is when the wrong mob is trapped. Ensure that there’s little chance that the wrong mob is trapped by picking a corner away from the group to trap. What works best for me is to trap a distance away (typically far, far back and even around the corner) and then telling my tank where it is. That way, he knows not to go back there with the tanked mobs.

Number 3: Establish Hate Early

Trapping only works if the enemy you’re been told to trap is coming to you. It does no good if you try to pull an enemy towards a trap if a healer gets a large crit on a heal and then pulls that mob towards him. Use Distracting Shot to pull the mob towards you; it generates a lot of hate and will allow you to trap multiple times without having to apply more hate during a fight. Sometimes you can get an Arcane Shot off before the mob is too close.

Number 4: Trap As Soon As You Can

In order to maximize the number of traps you can get over a period of time without having to either take hits or kite a mob, lay a trap down immediately after the mob is down (or, if Freezing Trap is still on cooldown, do it as soon as you can). This will allow you to begin to cooldown on the next trap while the mob is still trapped, which means that you may be able to get a few traps down before having to worry about getting hit.

Number 5: Watch Where You Trap

Where you lay your traps is very important. Trap too far away and you may end up losing the mob to the hate that has built up while it was trapped; trap too close to the mob and the second trap may spring on the trap before the old one has ended. For the initial traps, I prefer to move laterally from the group (so that my distance from the group remains the same but I’m still away from the mob) and lay a trap down then. For latter groups where healing hate has built up over time, I may lay a trap down either between a healer and the mob or even a long distance away, which would give me time to use another Distracting Shot on the mob to reestablish hate and gives me valuable seconds to allow my cooldowns to end.

Number 6: Line of Sight is Your Friend.

Use corners, columns, poles, and other parts of the environment to help you trap. You may lose opportunity to do damage during a fight, but if you’re tasked to keep a mob trapped your priority should be in keeping that mob trapped. When trying to trap casters, place the Freezing Trap along the corner of either a hallway or column and then move out of line of sight immediately after using a Distracting Shot. This will force the mob to come after you in order to attack you, negating its ability to do ranged damage on you and thereby avoid your trap. Also, many mobs will appear to be momentarily confused when you move out of line of sight or will run circles around a column trying to get to you, giving you more time for your cooldown to end - always a good thing since this will allow you to trap again sooner.

Please Note: This may not be necessary if you have Silencing Shot, but it is still good practice. If a mob is out of line of sight, it typically means that it is some distance away from where the main group is fighting. As a result, the likelihood of them accidently breaking your trap is minimized.

Number 7: Feign Death

Feign Death can be a good thing; Feign Death can be a bad thing. How you apply it will either aid you or harm you while trapping. In general, you should avoid feigning. When you feign, you lose all hate with all mobs (unless resisted), which means that the mob you have been diligently trapping will no longer be fixated on you and will run after the next highest person on its aggro table — usually your healer. That’s bad. On the other hand, feigning can help give you valuable time for your trap to cooldown. Feigning while far away from the group will give you some time during which the mob will run after another person; use another Distracting Shot to reassert your hate and lay down another trap as it runs towards you.

Please note: While Distracting Shot generates a lot of hate, during an extended fight where healers have been healing over a long period of time, it may not generate enough hate to get the mob back on you. I have been in fights where I have had to use a combination of two Distracting Shots, an Arcane Shot, and Steady Shot to reestablish hate on the previously-trapped mob.

Feign Death has one other major use in trapping. When the tank switches to your mob to tank, you should always Feign Death. Sometimes he may have difficulty picking up a mob if it runs immediately towards you when the trap is broken. Furthermore, this will help save you if a Taunt is resisted and help him to reestablish hate since you are probably a greater distance away than the next person on the list for hate.

Number 8: Don’t Panic!

Traps may be resisted. Traps may break early. This is especially true in a number of end-game instances where most of the mobs have had resistances increased. Also, your group members may break your traps. The important thing to do is keep your head. If you’ve been trapping smartly, you should be able to lay down another trap almost immediately after the trap is resisted or broken. If not, use Concussive Shot and put some distance between you and the mob — when trapping, distance means time, valuable time that will give your cooldowns time to end so that you can get the next trap down.

Number 9: Communication is a Beautiful Thing

Communication is very important. Know when you’re expected to trap. Let your group members — and the tank most importantly since he will most likely be the one moving the mobs — know where you plan on trapping. Inform the group if a trap breaks early and a mob is going to be running amok for any period of time. VOIPs like Ventrilo, Team Speak, and even Skype are amazingly helpful for this reason, since you can probably talk quicker than you type and so can share that information sooner.

Typically, in five-mans I am giving the tank periodic updates on my trapping as he is tanking. If a trap is resisted or breaks early, I let him know. I also inform him of how many times I think I can successfully trap before I know I’m going to start taking damage due to Freezing Trap cooldowns. Many times in pickups, we’ll choose to kill a sheeped target before even the trapped target if it looks like the mage is slow in crowd control; quick communication can easily coordinate these kind of things.

Number 10: Don’t be Afraid to Open Your Mouth

This goes hand-in-hand with Number 9: Communication is a Beautiful Thing. Don’t hesitate to say something if you have something to contribute. If there’s a hard group of mobs up ahead, offer to trap in order to aid in crowd control. Or, if you’ve been assigned a target to trap that seems difficult (for example, a casting mob when there’s no way to line of sight the enemy into a trap), explain why and then offer a suggestion as to which mob would be better to trap. If you don’t let your group and — more importantly — your group leader know what you can or can’t do, they can’t take advantage of the skills that you can bring to the group.

Number 11: Always Lay a Trap Down

I don’t care if your group has said that you won’t be trapping on a pull — get slightly away from the group, lay a trap down, and leave it there. The reasoning for this is simple: if the tank has problems holding hate on a mob or if another form of crowd control breaks early, you will already have a trap down to manage that mob until the tank can pick it back up. Furthermore, if you have that trap down before the mob breaks, it means that you can probably trap a number of consecutive times before having to let the tank pick it up. This is usually appreciated after the pull and should get you some praise and respect in the eyes of your group.

Please note: There are times that are clearly an exception to this rule. If a mob is likely to charge, you will not want to be at a ranged distance to trap. Furthermore, the existence of other mobs in the area may limit where you can go to trap. In these cases, it is usually best to avoid trapping since you’ll probably be trapping close to the group, which means that a target that you may not be intending to trap gets trapped. That annoys tanks and DPSers alike since they may get confused as to which target to attack if the one they were attacking suddenly got trapped. Instead, save your trap for when you see a mob break and then place it down as you use a Distracting Shot.

Number 12: Trapping Following a Misdirect is a Bitch

You know it. I know it. Not only are you doing stuff before a trap (during which time you would normally be just peeling a mob off from the tank), but you’ll probably blow all of your good hate-generating attacks before you try to reassert hate on a mob to bring it towards your trap. There are a couple of ways of handling trapping a mob following a Misdirection. You could always save your Distracting Shot for the single mob, which is preferable most of the time (except for when you’re pulling a boss, in which case you really should be using that extra push to build up hate on the tank so that DPS can open up earlier in damage). You can also hope to pull it using white damage and Arcane Shot (which has a quicker cooldown than Distracting Shot). The best way of doing this is to misdirect on the target you won’t be trapping and then hope you can pick it up later. Just be sure to let the tank know that you may have problems peeling the trapped target off initially.

Number 13: Have Fun!

I enjoy trapping. A lot. In fact, it’s my favorite part of being a hunter, since it is a display of skill on par with kiting and may include many of the same skills used in kiting. For example, you may find yourself kiting a mob for a couple of seconds during extended fights as your Freezing Trap is on cooldown. Practice, get good at it, and have fun — a successful hunter is one that can do more than just maximize damage and being able to trap well is an invaluable skill that will make you that much more valuable to groups. I found myself enjoying the class more as my responsibilities in a group expanded.

Y Halo Thar!