Category Archives: guides

Hunter Kindergarten: Intro to Steady Shot

So, you’ve reached level 50 with your hunter. Congratulations! One of my hunters just hit level 50 as well! His name is Althalor, and he’s a very deliciously good looking Blood Elf who lives with Tauren. This is him:

AlthalorLevel50

See, told you he was cute!

When you are level 50, you learn Steady Shot, and because this is a very important shot to all hunters, we’re giving it its own special post. Hunter Kindergarten is in session!

History Lesson: Steady Shot was introduced in Burning Crusade and originally you got it at level 62. It had a relatively short cast time, and it had to be used at very specific intervals to avoid “clipping” your Auto Shots, which would gimp your DPS. To get around this, many people made a macro which automated this process. As for me, well, that completely defeated one of the biggest reasons I enjoyed hunters so much, so I always hand-wove my Steadies.

With Wrath of the Lich King, Steady Shot was overhauled entirely. It was removed from being linked with Auto Shot so you no longer had to worry about timing, although its cast-time was made slightly longer. Unfortunately this meant all Beast Masters had to do was spam Steady over and over, which was heinously boring to me just as using the macro was in Burning Crusade, and it almost had me switching specs.

Never fear, Blizz came along with a Steady Shot nerf and an Arcane Shot buff and here we are today!

Today’s Steady Shot: Steady Shot, in and of itself, is not a very good shot, damage-wise. In fact, it’s pretty bad. For a lot of hunters, it does less damage than Auto Shot.

I see you raising your hand there, ready to ask why we use it then. Simple: it’s there to use when you can’t use anything else. And remember, even a little extra damage is still extra damage.

Keep in mind that because Steady Shot does have a cast time, it cannot be used while moving, and in my experience, you will rarely use it in PvP.

How And When: In general, Steady Shot is for use when everything else is on cooldown. Beast Master and Survival Hunters in particular will find themselves using it more than a Marksmanship hunter would, because a Marksmanship hunter has a few more shots to use. You don’t want to use it more than is necessary, though, because it typically does not do as much damage as any of your other shots. There are of course exceptions to the rule; for example, I know of Marksmanship hunters with very high amounts of Armor Penetration who are able to drop Arcane Shot from their rotation in favor of more Steadies, since Steadies are positively affected by Armor Penetration. For the most part, though, Steady Shot should be the lowest rung on the ladder. Basically, you always want to be doing some sort of special shot to fill in your Auto Shots, and since Steady has no cooldown, it fits the bill a lot of the time.

Glyph of Steady Shot is a very good glyph that many hunters tend to use, because pretty much all specs are using Serpent Sting now for various reasons and because a 10% boost to a shot that you are using so frequently is definitely not bad. Keep an eye out for it, and snag it when you can!

Warnings!: For a low level hunter who already has mana issues, Steady Shot is really going to exacerbate them. Some leveling hunters opt to forego using Steady Shot very much at these low levels to avoid this issue. Others, like me, JUST HAVE TO USE IT NO MATTER WHAT BECAUSE SHOT ROTATIONS ARE FUN AND SQUEE.

*cough*

You try it out for yourself and decide. >.>

Conclusion: Steady Shot has come a long way. It was designed to be a “filler shot”, was inadvertently turned into our main shot, and has finally been tuned into actually being a filler shot. Don’t treat him too badly, though; we may have broken up with him but he’s still a decent friend when no one else is around.

…nice guys finish last, don’t they…? *gently pats Steady Shot*

Straight for the Jugular! Go for the Throat and Company

The discerning blog reader who has clicked around on my links and Armory profiles lately may have noticed something interesting; namely, my two level eighty hunters, while both Beast Masters, are currently sporting (slightly) different specs:

TawynTalentSpecAug09

LunapikeTalentSpecAug09

Tawyn is using a 53/11/7 build, and Lunapike a 52/12/7. It may look like a difference of one talent point on the surface, but it’s actually three. Let’s dig deeper and take a look.

Tawyn has: 3/3 Cobra Strikes, 1/2 Go for the Throat, and 0/2 Invigoration.

Lunapike has: 2/2 Invigoration, 2/2 Go for the Throat, and 0/3 Cobra Strikes.

First, we’ll take a look at Invigoration vs. Cobra Strikes.

Why the difference?

Short answer
: Lunapike just hit 80, while Tawyn has been 80 for a while and has thus amassed a relatively decent set of gear.

Long answer: Cobra Strikes is a solid DPS boost. However, Invigoration should theoretically keep you out of Viper for longer and thus could also be construed as a DPS boost. Which one you want to take is situational.

Lunapike just hit 80, as I mentioned. At the moment she is mostly doing dailies, and five-mans and heroics where Replenishment may or may not happen. She also is still mostly in leveling duds and thus has a very small mana pool.

Tawyn has a larger mana pool and is mostly in raids these days, where there’s often a lot of mana regen being thrown around.

Guess who is going to want Invigoration, and guess who’s going to want Cobra Strikes?

Both are, in my mind, acceptable, though in general, I feel a level 80 hunter is going to eventually migrate from Invigoration to Cobra Strikes. Your mileage may vary, as always, so play around with it… but I sorta think this is a common sense one. /nod

Now, let’s move on to Go for the Throat, that lovely, lovely talent that all hunters everywhere of every spec should have at least one point in, because it’s such a DPS boost.

Lunapike has this talent maxed out. Tawyn only has one point in there… the “other” point is going to max out Cobra Strikes.

Why the difference?

Short answer: Lunapike just hit 80, while Tawyn has been 80 for a while and has thus amassed a relatively decent set of gear. (Why yes, I did just copy paste this from above.)

Long answer: Go for the Throat works off of critical strikes. The more you crit, the more focus you feed to your pet. Let’s compare the critical strike chance of our two examples, unbuffed:

Here’s Tawyn:

TawynStatsUnbuffedAug09

And here’s Lunapike:

LunapikeStatsUnbuffedAug09

Big difference in stats, huh? Especially in crit rating! Tawyn crits almost twice as much as Lunapike!

This, my friends, is why Tawyn can get away with only one point in Go for the Throat. Because she crits enough that she only needs one point in there. Actually, even Tawyn is barely squeaking by. The online hunter spreadsheet tells me that unbuffed, I could use another point in GftT, if I had one to spare. Fully raid-buffed, though, I’m good to go, so I feel fine with not having the extra point… it’s hard enough to find places to pull talent points from as it is; there are so many goodies out there for us to nab.

But can you imagine if Lunapike, with her mere 17% crit, only had one point in Go for the Throat? If the online hunter spreadsheet could have a stroke, it would. Of this I have no doubt. All the hunter theorycrafters of yesteryear would collectively roll in their virtual graves. It’d be a disaster, I tell ya!

Conclusion? Well, when it comes to Beast Mastery, there really is no set-in-stone spec. 41/20/0 and its rigidness has been nailed tightly in its coffin for some time now and in its place we have a little bit of flexibility. Having mana issues? Invigoration is the way to go. Not so much? Go for Cobra Strikes and scoop up the extra pet crits. Below about 30%ish crit? Two points in Go for the Throat. Otherwise, you can get away with just one.

But above all, remember to try things out, and see what gets you the best results. Heck, you may have the best results by dropping some of the points in Survival all together and distributing them among the talents we talked about today. Research: it does a hunter good.

And with that… hunterbots, roll out!

So You Want to Raid as a Beast Master Hunter

I recently had a comment left asking a question similar to “Is Beast Mastery viable in a casual ten-man Naxx raid?”

The answer is yes, yes, and very yes.

Because I did it once a week for a good few months, and heck, this was before pets had Wild Hunt and Shark Attack available– good ol’ post-nerfs but pre-3.1 Beast Mastery. (Then my Naxx group disintegrated and scientists are still baffled about it. True story.)

Anyways, I would hit 3800 or so on Patchwerk and slightly less on other bosses (Loatheb being the exception of course). Occasionally some rogue would pop out of nowhere and get 4000 and snag “First Place on Recount” from me but I can’t recall ever being worse than second.

If that isn’t viable enough for a “causal ten-man Naxx”, then I dunno what is!

WoW_PatchwerkShotBreakdownEdit

Of course, Beast Mastery is kinda touchy. Because it does the lowest DPS currently of all three hunter specs, it can be difficult to coax DPS out of it. Here is my advice to you:

Spec:

Have a viable spec. By viable I don’t mean “zomg most top DPS evar, no exceptions!” so much as a spec that isn’t just darts thrown at your talent tree. Back when I first began doing weekly Naxx runs, I was 53/18/0 and I did very well. I respec’d to 53/11/7 and did better, and I’m currently running with 54/12/5 which does the highest spreadsheet DPS in a 25man at the cost of slightly lower DPS in five-mans, as compared to 53/11/7. Both would get you roughly similar numbers in a ten-man. All of these three specs are good, as are specs that are very similar. See which one works best for you.

WoW_Arachnophobia

Glyphs/Rotation:

These go hand in hand together especially for us Beast Masters. You want at least Glyph of Bestial Wrath and Glyph of Steady Shot. Once you have these, your rotation is Bestial Wrath (when available) -> Kill Shot (when available) -> Arcane Shot -> Multishot -> Serpent Sting (when it needs to be refreshed) -> Steady Shot. Use Kill Command and Rapid Fire when they are up, as well. Kill Command works especially nicely in conjunction with Bestial Wrath.

A quick word on Multishot: I used to tell people to only use it when you have mana replenishment, however, I’ve been playing around with Zeherah’s Hunter DPS Analyzer (I am in love with it) and discovered that you should always use Multishot when you can.

I also used aforementioned website to try talenting into Aimed Shot, snagging the Glyph of Aimed Shot, and using that in place of Multishot. While the resulting numbers weren’t bad per se, they were still a fairly moderate DPS loss as opposed to spec’ing something like 53/11/7 and just using Multishot. So, that is that!

You will notice that I haven’t mentioned a must-have third glyph; you have a couple options here. Kill Shot, Hawk, and Serpent Sting are all viable ones. I get the best results with Serpent Sting myself: less having to refresh Serpent Sting, more time to do other shots!

WoW_TawynGoesRawr

Pet:

I still say you should use what you love when it comes to pets ^_^ however, Devilsaurs are the proven top DPS pet for Beast Masters at the moment. Raptors and Wolves are fairly close behind; I think Raptors edge ahead of Wolves a bit. Cats, Moths, Spirit Beasts, etc. aren’t bad options either, although they aren’t in the “Top Three”.

The important thing when it comes to pets is to have them spec’d for pewpew!

Following these simple steps will have you more than ready to conquer Naxx10 with a Big Red Pet. How viable is it for other, bigger raids, you may ask? Well, I’ve done OS25, VoA25, and a good portion of Naxx25 as BM and performed rather nicely. You may not be #1 on damage but you will be pulling your weight. As for Ulduar, well, I’ve no idea how you’d do in there, although there are some Beast Master hunters on my blogroll who are in Ulduar and are doing very well. There’s also a thread on Mania’s Forums dedicated to studying Beast Master DPS in Ulduar.

Oh, and did I mention this screenshot of the EU first kill of Yogg-Saron with no keepers? Notice the devilsaur in the picture and the little Ferocious Inspiration icon in the corner? It made me very happy to see that. To be fair, from what I understand, it’s largely because the mechanics of the fight favor DoTs, and your pet is essentially a very large DoT. Still, it’s proof that there is a time and place for Beast Mastery even among the best of the best.

In closing: If you wanna be a Beast Master, be a Beast Master. Most of us aren’t in the hardest of the hardcore raiding guilds and we can get away with it quite nicely! Bestial Wrath away, my friends.

WoW_KTAfter

Improved Mend Pet vs. Spirit Bond

If you are a Beast Mastery hunter, chances are good you have at least one or two talent points floating around in one of these two talents. In fact, if you are doing a fairly common 53/x/x build, then you really only have one point to spare.

So, where do you put that one point? Some people choose Endurance Training, but for me, I prefer to keep the choice between our good friends Spirit Bond and Improved Mend Pet. Let’s take a look at what they do:

1/2 Improved Mend Pet: “Reduces the mana cost of your Mend Pet spell by 10% and gives the Mend Pet spell a 25% chance of cleansing 1 Curse, Disease, Magic or Poison effect from the pet each tick.”

The mana cost reduction is relatively minute (though I suppose it would add up if you were using it a lot), so the big benefit here is mostly the shot IMP has at cleansing things off of your pet. This can be handy when solo’ing/questing to get rid of those nasty debuffs things will occasionally chuck onto your pet, and it can also be handy in a select few raid encounters. *coughHeigancough* Final verdict: Only has a very situational use, but very helpful in said situations.

1/2 Spirit Bond: “While your pet is active, you and your pet will regenerate 1% of total health every 10 sec., and increases healing done to you and your pet by 5%.”

I’ve had people debate me on this before, but I see the regeneration part of this talent as being, well… lackluster and ignorable. =P What we like this talent for is the flat increase on healing done to you and your pet. This could help a little on pet unfriendly fights, and also on player-unfriendly fights. May or may not be enough of a healing boost to save your/your pet’s life when crap hits the fan, though. Final verdict: Goes to waste on stuff like Patchwerk, but may make the life of your healers a tiny tad easier on stuff where there’s lots of AoE damage going around. Also makes your life a tiny tad easier on pet unfriendly fights.

And the Oscar goes to… Look at your situation and decide which one you’d rather have. Currently I am using Improved Mend Pet because I find it to be invaluable on Heigan; I am in Naxx more than most other raids combined at the moment and I pride myself on being able to keep my pet alive through the encounter. If I ever move on from Naxx I may very well move the point over to Spirit Bond. Both talents have their uses and I wouldn’t knock you for using either.

Bonus History Lesson:

Check out the final Beast Mastery talent back in World of Warcraft Beta:

BeastMasteryBeta

Survival’s final talent back then…? We shall not speak of it… >.>

Doctor Pike Is In: Fixing Your Hunter DPS

mario_house I get a pretty decent number of comments and e-mails from people asking for advice to help “fix” their DPS. The truth is, there is no giant Band-Aid that is gonna fix your DPS. However, there are a lot of symptoms we can look for to help diagnose the problem and see if we can solve it from there. Doctor Pike is in!

1. Spec: As of right now in Patch 3.1, Beast Mastery produces the lowest DPS of all the hunter specs. That’s not to say it can’t do good numbers, or isn’t viable. However, it’s quite possible that you will see an increase in DPS if you switch to Marksmanship, and then possibly a further DPS increase if you continue on to Survival (at least until you start getting into Ulduar gear). If you aren’t averse to a spec switch, you may want to experiment. If you really like your spec a lot, then that’s great too, and you can read on to see ways to optimize your chosen spec.

Make sure your talents work well together. I love the idea of a hybrid hunter in theory but in the end, there is really no particularly good hybrid build right now. Furthermore, don’t put points in things you don’t need. If you are a Survival hunter, then you don’t need Improved Arcane Shot. Why? Because you don’t use Arcane Shot!

Still, take a look at your situation and see what works for you. For example, I know my hunter DPS tends to idle at about 85-90% while leveling because I take all the talents like Endurance Training, Thick Hide, Spirit Bond, etc. in lieu of a more typical raid spec. But hey, that’s cause I’m leveling! =P And PvP is of course an entirely whole different creature. But you get the gist.

2. Pet Spec: Take a look at the screenshots on this post to see examples of a Ferocity pet build for both 16- and 20- pet talent points. As far as I am aware those are pretty much the max-DPS builds you can get: Charge will get you a tiny DPS increase but myself I don’t think it’s worth it to sacrifice stuff to pick it up since it’s a mid-tier talent. Dash/Dive does the same thing for a fraction less DPS and with the added bonus of being able to let your pet run quickly back to you if needed… Flame Walls on Sarth, for example, or other nasties! (That said, going 1/2 Bloodthirsty and then picking up Charge, if you are a Beast Master, might be worth looking into– I just haven’t tried it yet.)

Some people have asked me questions about Cobra Reflexes; last I checked those are in fact a net DPS gain.

If you can only take one point of Shark Attack or Wild Hunt, take Wild Hunt once you get somewhere above the range of 2500 attack power which just about every hunter should be at if they are level 80 or close to it. The stamina boost is nice too!

My thoughts on Heart of the Phoenix/Lick Your Wounds/etc are as follows: a.) you will have to sacrifice DPS talents to pick them up, and b.) The only time my pet dies is if it’s a wipe or if it’s a pet unfriendly fight and my pet will be dying every ten seconds anyway. So, they are not worth it to me. But as always, your mileage may vary!

3. Glyphs: In WotLK, glyphs can really make or break a spec. I find it kind of ironic because Blizzard introduced them as a way to further customize your character but often your choice of glyphs is rather cut’n’dry.

For example, if you are a Beast Master you pretty much NEED Glyph of Steady Shot and Glyph of Bestial Wrath. All Beast Master PvE specs should have at least those two glyphs. You have slightly more wiggle room with your third glyph; Kill Shot and Hawk are good options, myself, I use Serpent Sting.

I am not quite as knowledgeable with the other specs yet but as far as I’m aware, Glyph of Explosive Shot is pretty much a given for Survival, and Glyphs of Chimera Shot and Serpent Sting (to boost your Chimera Shot damage) are what you want for Marksmanship.

4. Gear/Gems: Most people are geared and gem’d fine so I don’t see this as something we need to go into in too much depth. Remember: The hit cap is important, especially now that it transfers to your pet. If you don’t have enough hit on your gear, gem for it. You want to be at 263 unless you are a draenei or have a draenei twin who follows you everywhere (or if you are Alliance and only ever do 25mans).

…or if you have points in Focused Aim. *almost forgot all about that* >.>

Intellect is a good stat for everybody now because pretty much all specs have 3/3 Careful Aim, and this is why I usually skip over leather gear, even if it is packed with other yummies.

Remember, you don’t need expertise, defense, etc. In the next patch your pets’ expertise will scale from your hit; this means you won’t need expertise in the next patch either, despite some rumors that are going around.

Gem-wise you will probably want to stick to Hit (if not capped), Agi and AP. AP is more of a Beast Master gem, although “when in down, gem Agi… uh… this doesn’t rhyme *cough*” You don’t want to overload on one stat, though. If you have a bunch of AP but your crit is in the toilet, or vice versa, it can often end up being a DPS loss. Which isn’t what you want! =P

and lastly 5. Rotation! This is a good first place to look if you are having DPS issues. I’d advise you to check out my Shot Rotation Compendium for a quick rundown of what you should be doing rotation-wise for each spec, and read the comments too, because said guide isn’t 100% conclusive.

Now there are some things that may be adversely affecting your DPS which you can’t do much about. Stinky internet connections and lag, poor computer performance, or even simply a lack of familiarity with a certain spec will put you at a disadvantage. Hopefully, though, I’ve covered the basics well enough to help a few of you out.

Now go take two pills and call me in the morning. And remember, don’t get discouraged if it takes you a while to “fix” your DPS… afterall, we all know what happens when the doctors on TV think the case is solved and it’s only halfway through the episode, riiiight? =P

A Hunter's Guide to Naxxramas Bosses: Frostwyrm Lair

In the spirit of A Hunter’s Guide to Karazhan Bosses, I now present you with: A Hunter’s Guide to Naxxramas Bosses! A quick reference guide for those of you who are perhaps newer to Naxx. Remember though, you may or may not do the bosses in this order… so a handy-dandy navigation menu for you (articles will be linked to as they go live):

Navigation:
Spider Wing: Anub’rekhan, Grand Widow Faerlina, Maexxna
Plague Wing: Noth the Plaguebringer, Heigan the Unclean, Loatheb
Abomination Wing: Patchwerk, Grobbulus, Gluth, Thaddius
Military Wing: Instructor Razuvious, Gothik the Harvester, Four Horsemen
Frostwyrm Lair: Sapphiron, Kel’Thuzad

FROSTWYRM LAIR:

Sapphiron:

sapphiron2

“Once a noble blue dragon within the mountains of Northrend, Sapphiron was slain by Arthas during his campaign through the frozen north. Resurrected to serve him, Sapphiron guards Kel’Thuzad’s lair eternally, awaiting those who would dare tresspass upon his master.”

DPS Sapphiron. Let the healers know if you get cursed. Don’t stand in the blizzard.

When Sapphiron flies up in the air, run towards the entryway (where you came in)– two people will be turned into iceblocks. Unless you are one of those people, run behind the ice block and don’t move. Sapphiron will do a move that will one-shot anyone who isn’t standing behind an ice block.

Sapphiron will land, rinse and repeat.

It’s not a bad idea to misdirect to the tank everytime Sapphie lands.

Sapphiron has a wonky hitbox; I’ve found myself melee’ing him on accident more than once even though I was seriously standing on the other end of the room. Sorta like Onyxia. Soooo just watch out for that!

Kel’Thuzad:

kelthuzad_comic

“The Lich, Kel’Thuzad. He serves the Lich King without question, a necromancer of great prowess in life, turned to a master of necromancy after his death. It is said he is the most loyal of the Lich King’s subjects.”

This fight is split up into two very different phases. During phase one keep your pet by your side at all times. There will be stuff coming towards you (you will be standing in the circle in the center of the room) that you will want to kill. Your job will firstly be on the little skeletons, but as you progress you will be focusing more on the banshees. Don’t touch the abominations! The melee and tanks will deal with those.

After this, Kel’Thuzad himself will show up. First thing’s first: spread out. Don’t be standing next to anyone. (But be sure you’re still in range of as many healers as you can get. Very important.)

DPS Kel’Thuzad. Watch out for Void Zones that will show up under you; move if one does. Sometimes something will happen called “mana detonation”, it drains your mana and blows up anyone standing next to you (see what I meant about spreading out?)

People will get ice-blocked. IF THIS HAPPENS TO YOU, IT IS IMPERATIVE THAT YOUR HEALERS KNOW IMMEDIATELY, if you don’t get any heals you will die in about two seconds. Depending on the experience level of your raid you will probably have to either announce in Vent or spam a macro or something.

Partway through the fight giant bugs will show up that a tank will pick up. You may be asked to misdirect these to the tank; it helps to have a macro ready for this. ( /cast [target=tank’s name] Misdirection , then shoot the bugs.)

If you’re on 25-man KT you’ll get mind controlled sometimes, you’ll just have to deal with it as far as I’m aware (KT is one of the few Naxx fights I haven’t done on 25-man yet x_x)

Warning: It is very possible for your pet to eat void zones. The likelihood of this happening increases with the amount of melee DPS in your raid group. If you can’t keep a very close eye on your pet and your group is melee heavy, you may opt to have him sit this one out, at least for the first part of the KT fight. He can usually go safely back in once the bugs come out.

Grats on beating Naxx!

…wait, a challenger appears!

Mr. Bigglesworth

image_of_mr_bigglesworth

“The last living creature in Naxxramas, this cat is said to be the last thread connecting Kel’thuzad to his mortal life. It is said that any who dare to harm a hair on his head doom themselves to… well, nevermind. I’m sure no one would be foolish enough to lay a hand on Kel’thuzad’s precious pet. “

funny-pictures-exclamation-cat

…I say we take off and nuke the cat from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.

And so our heroes have reached the end of their journey and returned home safely. But because we want you to keep tuning in, next time REVENGE OF THE SON OF MISTER BIGGLESWORTH, THE NINJA MECHA-CAT WITH LUPUS.

*static*

A Hunter's Guide to Naxxramas Bosses: Military Wing

In the spirit of A Hunter’s Guide to Karazhan Bosses, I now present you with: A Hunter’s Guide to Naxxramas Bosses! A quick reference guide for those of you who are perhaps newer to Naxx. Remember though, you may or may not do the bosses in this order… so a handy-dandy navigation menu for you (articles will be linked to as they go live):

Navigation:
Spider Wing: Anub’rekhan, Grand Widow Faerlina, Maexxna
Plague Wing: Noth the Plaguebringer, Heigan the Unclean, Loatheb
Abomination Wing: Patchwerk, Grobbulus, Gluth, Thaddius
Military Wing: Instructor Razuvious, Gothik the Harvester, Four Horsemen
Frostwyrm Lair: Sapphiron, Kel’Thuzad


MILITARY WING
:

Instructor Razuvious:

instructor_razuvious

“Pay attention. This is Instructor Razuvious, Kel’Thuzad’s appointed trainer of all death knights. It is said that his own technique is so potent, only a disciple of his could possibly withstand his might.”

Primarily a fight for whoever is going to be operating the mind-control-dealybobs, this is a DPS fest pure and simple for hunters. Well, aside from the giggling that you’re allowed to do at the expense of Razuvious’s crew-cut. *cough* Be careful when using Multishot because I’ve seen the Mind Control wear off for a second sometimes. Other than that, be watchful for a knife that is going to be flung around to various raid members and will put a big DoT on you. You may have to call this out over Vent if your healers are newer to the instance and not expecting it.

Gothik the Harvester:

gothik_the_harvester

Gothik, the Harvester. A master of necromancy and conjuration, Gothik is said to be able to beckon forth legions of the undead at a moment’s notice. It is with his guidance that even the weakest of Death Knights can raise the dead.

This is another one of those “put your pet on Defensive” fights. So do that!

Fight goes like this: the raid will be split up into two groups, one for “Live Side” and one for “Dead Side”. “Dead Side” is the one with piles of skulls in it, so you know where to go if you’re assigned there.

Stuff is going to show up on Live Side and when they die they’ll show up as ghosts on Dead Side. DPS them down. Starts out slowly but gets more hectic as time goes on, and I’ve seen more wipes here than I care to admit (mostly from Live Side going too fast and overwhelming Dead Side).

Eventually Gothik will show up and teleport back and forth between the sides before the gates open and everyone can just focus on him. He goes down very surprisingly quick and for the most part, when he shows up, you know you’ve won– go directly to epics, do not pass Go, do not collect 200 gold.

Take your pet off of Defensive after this fight. >.>

Four Horsemen:

fourhorsemen_original

“The most powerful Death Knights within Naxxramas are the four horsemen. They represent the pinnacle of Kel’Thuzad’s guard.”

I adore this encounter. It may take a little while for you to realize what’s going on, and strategies differ from group to group, but I still <3 it. If you are in the “front”: There are two main strategies here. The first strategy, and the one commonly used if your DPS is still gearing up, is for the two tanks to swap out their bosses. What this means is that you will DPS a boss until you get three “marks”– a stacking debuff– on you, at which point the tanks will run to the middle and switch our their bosses, and this will continue until the two bosses are down. The second strategy, commonly used if your DPS is good and/or you have a shaman for Heroism/Bloodlust, is to burn down the first boss and then run over and burn down the second. Either way, be sure you are standing as close to the boss as you can while still maintaining range– there will be issues if you are standing far away!

Once the two bosses in front are down, head to the back and take turns DPS’ing the two bosses back there. Just keep an eye out for your own marks on you, if you get a stack of three you want to head to the other boss for a while.

If you are in the “back”
: Hunter tank! Woot! I love the back. I always volunteer for it. I know it’s silly, but hey. You’ll be back here with someone who can heal and so your main job is, literally, to “tank” a boss back here. They don’t hit very hard and are casters, so basically you’ll just be shooting them and then swapping to the other boss with someone else when necessary – i.e, when you’ve got three marks on you. I would advise against sending your pet in– Ferocity pets die pretty quickly unless you know your healer will be keeping him up. Also, these bosses target whoever is closest, so you can keep your pet by your side, just turn a little so you are the closer to the boss of the two of you.

And that, as they say, is that.

And so our heroes make their way to the dreaded Frostwyrm Lair, home of some of Azeroth’s most vile denizens. Find out why Sapphiron is Mister White Christmas and Mister Snow tomorrow… same time, same place!

A Hunter's Guide to Naxxramas Bosses: Construct Wing

In the spirit of A Hunter’s Guide to Karazhan Bosses, I now present you with: A Hunter’s Guide to Naxxramas Bosses! A quick reference guide for those of you who are perhaps newer to Naxx. Remember though, you may or may not do the bosses in this order… so a handy-dandy navigation menu for you (articles will be linked to as they go live):

Navigation:
Spider Wing: Anub’rekhan, Grand Widow Faerlina, Maexxna
Plague Wing: Noth the Plaguebringer, Heigan the Unclean, Loatheb
Abomination Wing: Patchwerk, Grobbulus, Gluth, Thaddius
Military Wing: Instructor Razuvious, Gothik the Harvester, Four Horsemen
Frostwyrm Lair: Sapphiron, Kel’Thuzad


CONSTRUCT WING
:

Patchwerk:

patchwerk1

“Behold, Patchwerk. When word of his existence first reached the ears of the Brotherhood, none believed the tales of an abomination with such immense speed and strength. Fewer still believed it when he fell the first time…”

Shoot him in the face until he dies. Optional: screenshot your Recount/record your WWStats results so you can analyze how you perform in DPS race under a raid situation.

Grobbulus:

grobbulus

“Grobbulus, the first of what was to be an army of flesh giants. It carried the plague slime of Naxxramas within its body, injecting the living ooze into the bodies of its foe. The recipient of this foul injection would usually flee to his allies, bringing them down with him. “

Stand in the middle of the room. The tank will kite good ol’ Grobby around and you will spend most of the fight pewpew’ing either him, or a slime add that will show up every so often which your off-tank will probably pick up. Avoid the big green mists of death on the floor that show up behind the boss.

Sometimes you will get a debuff on you; usually someone in the raid and/or Deadly Boss Mods will point it out to you in big letters. Run away from the raid! Find some safe spot behind Grobby and between the aforemtnioned green mists of death and wait for the debuff to go away before resuming your original position. You’ll take some damage from this but it won’t kill you– unless you run through the green mists or are standing to close to people.

Your pet is immune to said debuff so he can spend the fight happily nomming the boss. Beware though: sometimes if you run to the opposite end of the room while you have the debuff, it will be so far away from your pet that he will despawn. So be ready to Call Pet if that happens.

Gluth:

gluth

“Gluth, the foul plague-dog of Naxxramas, was said to have an appetitie so voracious that even the living were not enough to satisfy his hunger. Feugen was said to feed him an army of Zombies daily, recycling the remains of undead too weak to use in combat. “

The best way I’ve ever taken this guy out involved everyone hitting macros in a precise sequence and misdirecting to Evasion-tanking rogues in a certain order. It was awesome, but chances are good that you’ll do this a slightly more conventional way, I’m afraid. =P

First thing to be aware of: your pet is going to sit in the tube and refuse to come out and play. The easy method to fixing this is to run as far away from the tube as you can after you’ve jumped down, which will despawn your pet and let you call him again. Just don’t make the mistake I did the first few times I did this fight, and not realize that my pet wasn’t there until the boss was already at 75% health (or lower).

Second thing to be aware of: this is one of those glorious encounters where you will probably get to eschew DPS in favor of utility, and I love it. Basically, there are zombies that will show up and slowly make their way towards Gluth. If they get to him, bad things happen. So they have to be kited around, either by you, or by someone else who can kite them. Either way there’s a good chance you will be asked to keep a Frost Trap up on the grate.

Every so often everybody’s health will plummet and all the zombies will stop what they’re doing and head towards Gluth; this is called “Decimate.” When this happens it’s your job to forget everything and AoE down the zombies as fast as you can. Then, you can return to whatever your previous job was, whether that was kiting the zombies or doing moderate DPS while keeping traps up.

If you are would like tips on actually kiting the zombies, Drotara does a good job explaining it over at his blog.

Thaddius:

thaddius

“Thaddius, built from the flesh of women and children, it is said that their souls are fused together – eternally bound within that foul prison of flesh.”

Fight starts out with having to DPS down two “minibosses” of sorts. The main thing here is that they have to die within a few seconds of each other– like Romulo and Julianne. The main difference from that fight is because you are split into two different groups your goal is to do DPS to your miniboss at the same rate that the other group is doing DPS to theirs. If your group is pulling ahead and you need to slow down, this can be accomplished by switching to Viper, going pure Auto-shots, or some combination of the above depending on how much you need to slow down.

After these guys are down you will jump off the ledge over to the other side. Yes, this is the infamous “ledgeboss”. Hint: Aspect of the Cheetah.

Once on the other side your pet will start to run down the ramp to you but he will despawn before he can get to you so just get ready to Call Pet once you notice he does.

Alright! Remember Heroic Mech? No? Okay, this guy basically puts a Positive or Negative debuff on everybody. Positives have to stand next to Positives, and Negatives next to Negatives, or Very Bad Things™ will happen. Your raid leader will let you know beforehand where to stand depending on your charge. Usually it is on the left or right side of Thaddius but I’ve seen front/behind done too. So if you see something like: – – – – – – – – – THADDIUS++++++++ spammed in Raid Warning, that’s what they’re referring to.

The charges will change every ten seconds or so and when they do keep in mind that your charge may or may not change. If it doesn’t change and you’re already in position, don’t move. One time I did a whole fight on this guy where I only had to move once, it was beautiful.

Again, your pet is immune to all the fun, so just leave him on the boss and enjoy what is otherwise a Pewpew fest.

Tomorrow our heroes head into Military Wing! Will they be able to face four all-powerful Death Knights and the horses they rode in on? Or will they prove that perhaps DKs aren’t as overpowered as everyone thinks? Find out on the next exciting episode!

A Hunter's Guide to Naxxramas Bosses: Plague Wing

In the spirit of A Hunter’s Guide to Karazhan Bosses, I now present you with: A Hunter’s Guide to Naxxramas Bosses! A quick reference guide for those of you who are perhaps newer to Naxx. Remember though, you may or may not do the bosses in this order… so a handy-dandy navigation menu for you (articles will be linked to as they go live):

Navigation:
Spider Wing: Anub’rekhan, Grand Widow Faerlina, Maexxna
Plague Wing: Noth the Plaguebringer, Heigan the Unclean, Loatheb
Abomination Wing: Patchwerk, Grobbulus, Gluth, Thaddius
Military Wing: Instructor Razuvious, Gothik the Harvester, Four Horsemen
Frostwyrm Lair: Sapphiron, Kel’Thuzad

PLAGUE WING:

Noth the Plaguebringer:

noth_the_plaguebringer

“Behold, Noth, the Plaguebringer. Responsible for the creation of the process that distills the souls of the living and places them within the cold cage of undeath, Noth was observed to be refining this process even now.”

Also a Brewmaker, whatadya know?

Pretty easy fight and one of the few fights where I actually take my pet off of Passive and put him on Defensive. Here’s how it works:

DPS Noth. Skeleton adds will show up. Let the tank(s) pick them up.

Noth teleports away. AoE the skeletons down. (This is why I put my pet on Defensive, he helps to hammer all the skeletons).

Noth comes back. Repeat steps one and two until he is dead.

Arguably the easiest fight in the raid in terms of what everyone has to do.

Oh, and don’t forget to put your pet back on Passive after this.

Heigan the Unclean:

heigan_the_unclean

“Observe, Heigan the Unclean. The mastermind behind the plague cauldrons that turned the wilderness of Azeroth into the Plaguelands. It is said that Heigan has rigged the very walls and floors of Naxxramas itself with a vast array of traps, which he can trigger at will. “

The most infamous fight in the instance and home of the good ol’ Safety Dance. It used to be I’d say “If you’ve never done this fight before, you will die, don’t feel bad”, but recently I’ve seen a few talented people nail this on their first try so I rescind that statement.

Basically it goes like this. When the fight begins, stand up on the platform where Heigan was. Depending on your group they will be tanking him either at the edge of the platform or on “the dance floor” itself. Keep a Mend Pet up at all times. This will go a long way towards your pet surviving this fight, especially if you are BM and have Improved Mend Pet.

After a short while Heigan will teleport up onto the platform, at which point you will jump down with the rest of the group and “dance” across the floor while green fire shoots up in front of you and behind you. Really this is all about coordination and moving at the right speed. I’ve found it helps if you basically just keep moving (or stop only for a split second)– if you stop and wait around between the the fire spurting up, you will die. Try and stay close to everyone else if you haven’t done it before, but beware of lag. Oh, and I would be wary about having Aspect of the Cheetah on– I tried it once, got hit by the fire and dazed, and yeah. Kindred Spirits works well enough. If you know what you’re doing you’re allowed to do Serpent Stings and Arcane Shots and the like on Heigan during the dance phase, but I wouldn’t try it if you are new to it… you don’t want to overcomplicate things afterall.

Eventually Heigan will jump back down and you go back up onto the platform, and repeat the previous steps until he goes down.

Mostly the big thing here is the disease that Heigan tosses around that needs to be cleansed. Some healers will cleanse your pet, others won’t. That is why Improved Mend Pet helps a lot.

Overall this fight is one of those “Difficult to learn but easy to master” fights that usually becomes a favorite once you know what you’re doing. It’s probably second to Four Horseman for my favorite encounter in Naxx.

Oh, and I recommend you check out my YouTube video on it if you haven’t already! It will probably explain things better than I can in text. You can download the video for free at https://www.keepvideonline.com/.

Confession: I don’t ever do this fight without The Safety Dance playing in the background. Ever.

Confession Two: I am listening to the Men Without Hats Greatest Hits as I write this.

Confession Three: It’s all I’ve listened to for like the past two weeks.

Loatheb:

loatheb

“Loatheb. The hideous result of fusing the living plague of the plaguelands with the bog beasts of Azeroth, Loatheb is said to control the power of healing itself.”

An anagram for “healbot”, Loatheb is mostly a healers’ fight. This doesn’t really affect you in any way other than the fact that while you may be tempted to use Lifeblood/potions/healthstones if you see your health getting low, but be aware that a heal is probably incoming shortly if you wait a few more seconds, and if not, wait until healing is allowed to use your emergency health pot because it will go to waste if you don’t.

Mostly you will be spending this fight soaking up the big numbers that you will get. Spores will be floating around the room, you will be directed to go stand next to the spore and possibly kill it in an order that will probably be determined by your raid leader. These spores will up your crit chance to some ridiculous number and is what will be the driving factor behind aforementioned big numbers. That’s about it. It can turn into a long fight so look forward to popping some of your cooldowns more than once (and possibly having to refresh Hunter’s Mark.)

And tomorrow, our brave heroes venture into Construct Wing. Abominations in disguise? Find out on our next exciting episode of A Hunter’s Guide to Naxxramas Bosses!

A Hunter's Guide to Naxxramas Bosses: Spider Wing

In the spirit of A Hunter’s Guide to Karazhan Bosses, I now present you with: A Hunter’s Guide to Naxxramas Bosses! A quick reference guide for those of you who are perhaps newer to Naxx. Going to split it up by wings to make it easier to navigate. Remember though, you may or may not do the bosses in this order… so a handy-dandy navigation menu for you (articles will be linked to as they go live):

Navigation:
Spider Wing: Anub’rekhan, Grand Widow Faerlina, Maexxna
Plague Wing: Noth the Plaguebringer, Heigan the Unclean, Loatheb
Abomination Wing: Patchwerk, Grobbulus, Gluth, Thaddius
Military Wing: Instructor Razuvious, Gothik the Harvester, Four Horsemen
Frostwyrm Lair: Sapphiron, Kel’Thuzad

SPIDER WING:

Anub’rekhan:

anubrekhan

“Anub’Rekhan, one of the finest Spider Lords of Azjol’Nerub, was brought under the control of the Scourge when he and his former commander, Anub’arak, were finally defeated by the Lich King many years ago. It is said that he was the most loyal of Anub’arak’s commanders. “

In my own personal experience, most (though not all) groups like to start with Spider Wing first, so there is a good chance that this will be the first boss you meet if you go in here as Naxx-newbie. In a way, it’s kind of a hectic fight compared to some of the others, but in another way, I think it just looks like there’s a lot going on here when really there’s not.

For the most part you’ll just want to stand in the middle (there’s a handy green circle on the ground showing you where to stand) and pewpew. Sometimes adds will show up, AoE down the little ones and wait for an offtank to pick up the big ones and then shoot ’em down. Really the only thing you need to be aware of is a move that happens every so often called “Locust Swarm” which causes a lot of damage to the melee DPS. That includes your pet. Most groups will call out when Locust Swarm happens (or a DeadlyBossMods-style addon will announce it) so pull your pet back to you or have him go chew on the adds until it’s over.

Sometimes you’ll get tossed up in the air if spikes appear under you and you don’t move away fast enough. Not a lot you can do about it, you can keep shooting while you’re up there. Remember the handy dandy hunter trick: Disengage on your way down prevents you from receiving fall damage.

That’s about it, really!

Grand Widow Faerlina

faerlina

“The Grand Widow Faerlina, a botanist in life, breeder and caretaker of arachnids in death, she oversees the spider wing, developing the most potent of poisons for the Lich King.”

Another hectic-feeling fight, though once again your job as a hunter is pretty straightforward: Shoot Faerlina in the face. The way groups do this varies; geared groups can typically just burn her down after destroying all the adds, but most starter groups will inform you at various points throughout the fight to switch DPS to one of the adds (they’ll usually all be marked up for you.) Because of this I typically ban Multishot from my rotation in this fight unless positioning is good because I don’t want to accidentally do damage to the adds when I’m not supposed to, even if it is just a little damage.

Sometimes there will be a Rain of Fire where you’re standing, move out of it and keep shooting. (Cause it burns burns burns… the rain of fire).

Maexxna:

maexxna

“Maexxna, born deep within the mountains of Northrend many ages ago, she was captured within the dread citadel Naxxramas, where she gives birth to her brood, feeding them the corpses of all who dare venture too deeply into Naxxramas. “

Hunters, there is a 99.9% chance your job on this fight will be: “Shoot the people on the wall.” Make it your mantra.

See, Maexxna is a giant spider who flings spider webs around and occasionally sticks people to the wall with a web wrap. It’ll be your job to shoot them free. Just have your mini-map all the way zoomed out, look out for pings and listen for people calling out that they are web wrapped. And be sure to announce if you get web wrapped so someone else can come save you!

Other than that, it’s another semi-hectic pewpew fest with adds and stuff. Feign Death will shake the little spiderlings off of you if you accidentally aggro one while Multi-shotting.

And so our brave heroes head off to the vile Plague Wing, home to plaguebringers, spore monsters, and dancing necromancers. Will they triumph? Will they dance, jive, and have the time of their life? Be sure to turn in tomorrow to see!