I am so happy to have found a place of nice WoW players that are willing to take a little time and help. You'll find I will do the same some day when I know what I'm doing. I do a lot of volunteer work in real life and believe in giving back when I can.
I've only been playing since August, as something to do with my kids who play (but are young and don't have the answers I'm looking for) and got hooked pretty good.I just turned level 80 yesterday and am now questioning if I have raised (if that's the right word) my character incorrectly. I've gotten here mainly through questing with a little PvP and dungeons. I did one day of solid PvP to get enough honor points to get level 70 equipment, which is what I wear (brutal gladiator i think).
Anyway I wanted a nice flying mount so I started questing in Dragonblight, got a tabard and started doing dungeons at level 79 to get high enough reputation to buy a mount. I turned level 80 and tried to do some more random dungeons and I was locked out because my average equipment level is too low. I went into random battlegrounds to earn some honor points to buy some level 80 equipment and I am getting slammed!. Most other players can kill me with 1 or 2 hits whereas I keep nailing them repeatedly to see their life barely go down, then just pop back to full. I also noticed that these guys have lives of like 45,000, where I'm at only 14,000.
All this leads me to believe I'm way off somewhere, and that I've built my character wrong. I've tried reading different websites, but there's so much jargon/code that most of it doesn't make sense to me (stuff like you're OCB should be in ERV range if you want to BXZ at a good level - I made that up, but it's the kind of stuff I see)
I don't know hot to link to my character, but if someone tells me how I will. In the mean time I'm Elusepher on the Ursin server
Again thanx for any advice you can give. It's a very complex game and there's so much to try to understand, I'm always hearing about things I don't understand.
Welcome to the joint Elusepher! Go to Armory, highlight the http part, copy and paste it here like this, I'm using a real hunter here, not myself 😉
http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/nerzhul/Xeloda/simple
Hey Elus,
I'm pretty new here but not to the game. 6 years and counting.
Once you past lvl 80 the game has changed. When Cataclysm came out th drastically changed the amount of health a player would have. They did however scale this to lower levels (I think) but not anything near as drastic.
What it comes down to is gear. If I read right you probably mostly in lvl 70 pvp gear. Which does not have nearly the same type of stats an lvl 80+ would. Items at 81 are better than Epic lvl 80 items (in general)
Also many people have and use Heirloom gear that they purchased with either honor points or other currency. This gear allows scales as they level. Most pieces stop at 80 while a helm and cloak go to 85.
So really the biggest challenge is being undergeared at the moment. In time through quest you can start adding new pieces.
The reason you unable to get into a random instance (dungeon) is due to the fact being it is your gear. It is trina to place you into one that is lets say for characters that are lvl 81 but you gear just holing you back atm. What you could do is try to continue by doing lvl 80 dungeons on heroic or regular. But honestly I believe the best and fastest way at this point would be to quest.
If you have the gold you could try buying a couple pieces in the auction house if it seems reasonable enough.
I hope this kinda helps.
Welcome, Elusepher!
What exactly is your goal as a Hunter? Are you looking to level up and Raid or do mostly PvP and Battlegrounds? If PvE is your game then you're really going to want to do a lot more random dungeons to get boss drops for your gear. It's been a long time since I was lvl 80 so I'm not 100% sure, but maybe you'll need to do more questing? I would think there should be plenty of Northrend instances you can queue for, even at your ilvl.
For pure DPS, PvP gear will give you higher ilvl# but will not help you as much as the instance dropped gear will, ultimately. Resilience does nothing for PvE encounters.
If you're planning to PvP a lot or do a lot of random BGs, you're on the right track, I think, but I'm more of a PvE player and there a many excellent PvPers here who will chime in with great advice along those lines.
Keep at it and have fun, we'll get you some more info shortly.
Xeloda, thanks for the advice. I'm definitely not hitting the action house after buying flight mastery. I've been questing all along and haven't gotten any really good gear, so I think the instances are probably better unless you know that I'll get better drops because of my level? I guess I was looking to hit the random instances to get the bonuses. What's the difference between heroic and regular?
Ozolin, Thanx to you too. PvE is what I like so far, but that's the problem or catch 22 isn't it - your advice is to do more random dungeons for better gear, but the game won't let me do random dungeons without the gear. I don't really enjoy PvP all that much - like I said I'm dead at 1 hit so it's very frustrating. I like questing and dungeons when I know I won't be interrupted, but doesn't the questing end when you hit lvl 85? isn't PvP and Raiding what you do at 85+?
By PvP gear do you mean the stuff I got with honor points?
Elusepher,
Your gear is definately dragging you down. You should have gotten some more appropriate level gear from quests along the way to 80. My recommendation is to keep doing quests. There is some decent gear to be had there.
Also, hit up the normal level instances, they will provide you with gear that will eventually allow you access to the heroic level instances, which in turn will provide you gear for raids if you wish to partake in them. There is also daily quests along the way that usually provide you with gold and possibly gear.
Another thing you might do is pick up a profession that provides gear, such as Leatherworking and Engineering. Leatherworking would give you some armor, while Engineering would provide you with ranged weapons (guns mostly).
Follow Tak's advice with regards to questing, definitely, especially if you're not able to get into the random instances @ 80 yet.
The PvP gear is what you buy with Honor pts, it has Resilence on it which you don't need in PvE. It's basically robbing you of a more useful DPS stat. Do the quests that are yellow or orange to your lvl, those gear rewards will help you get to the ilvl for randoms and by the time you're 85 you'll be doing heroic instances for not only gear drops but Justice and Valor points for your tier gear.
If you like questing then you're in luck, quest your way towards 85 and gear to get into the regular Cataclysm instances. You'll soon find yourself unlocking more of them and eventually heroics. The quests will also help you raise your Reputation levels. At 85 there are excellent gear rewards from the Faction quartermasters as well as your ideal head & shoulder enchantments.
WarcraftHuntersUnion.com is another good resource for gear & enchantment/gem guides, though many of us can tell you what's in them too 🙂 Also, I've found Noxxic.com to be a nicely laid out resource for all classes if you need a quick, basic, outline.
Don't put too much stock into any one resource. Use them all, ask more questions of us here, talk to other Hunters on your server in-game. I'm no expert but I read a LOT and I enjoy trying and testing new things, and sharing what I find. Even with Hunters like Agio 😉
Elus-
What Takaas said plus I suggest you do hit the AH initially, particularly for your fingers-you have 2 rings with strength on them which is useless to us. The items you're looking for should be cheap greens. I'd do this in mail armor and weapons as well. I'd suggest you enter Level 78-80 in the search box to narrow the search. Greens will be affordable, Blues will probably be pricey as people are levelling alt characters so unles it's dirt cheap, skip it. You don't need blues right now, you just need to get geared up so you can take on the content in PvE and get into some instances.
When you mouseover an item in the AH the spec benefits will show up compared to what you have. They shouldn't run you anymore than a few gold each as most of it is either sold straight to a vendor as trash or listed on AH cheap for enchanters to disenchant.
If you're totally broke, I really suggest you do some more solo quests in Northrend, maybe even the higher level Outlands zones. I soloed the entire game and their is definitely better rewards than what you are geared with right now. Your better PvP gear should suffice til you get some of the better L79-80 PvE gear. You can Google a quest to see what the rewards will be before you go on it to see if the gear is an improvement and if you can finish the quest line off. Often the 'best' gear is at the end of a quest line and the quest usually requires 3 people or so. If you have a couple friends, then it's a snap. If you can gear up on the cheap from the AH, it'll make life easier. Once you get geared better you can move to the Cataclysm Zones where the quest rewards are a huge improvement. Your hit rating is also at 1.40%. I 'think' @ 80 you want to be around 6-7% so you don't miss all the time-you are probably missing a fair amount now with the 1.4% rating. The gear itself from quests will get that up.
Also, even though it's a bit of a grind and you'll have to go back and do old zones, I'd suggest maybe taking skinning and dropping Inscription unless it's generating you good money or more importantly, you like it. So many players are levelling alts right now there is big demand for old content leather. So you can make some gold while killing stuff, which may actually drop something you can use:) Herbalism should be making you some loot. Grab a scope for you ranged weapon-I 'think" it''s a deadly scope, can't recall @ 80. Make sure it isn't a higher level than your weapon stat. Most of your equipment needs enchants but it'll be a waste of money now given you'll be upgrading your gear.
I notice you don't have all your Glyph slots filled, as you're playing MM other players can help you with what should be slotted but that too will help. If you switch to BM, I'll get you in some trouble with builds and such:)
Also, drag all of your pets out of the stable so they are all at the same level as you-happens as soon as you summon them. Then fill out all their talent trees-your dog has a lot of unused talent points. You don't have a ferocity pet, they are quite good for solo questing. So go tame a cat or wolf.
Hope some of this helped (Ozolin actually wrote it all for me-he's my hero)
Elusepher - welcome to the Lodge! You have some wonderful advice above and I completely understand where you are coming to, right down to eyeballing the kids for advice (my son now plays ten times better than me; his first character he rolled was a hunter so he could know what to pick on me about… now he's world ranked on his rogue, that addiction joke is on him.) at any rate, in addition to all the spectacular drivel above (I'm impressed you could tear Ozzolicious away from a mirror long enough to pontificate), I would also add playing around with the research at http://www.wowhead.com
You can play around with what you are looking for, and apply filters, such as the item slot (do you want a chest piece, or pants?) weight it for hunter loot (it's all hunter loot), and most importantly for you to gear up quickly so that you CAN do dungeons, obtained by questing. I also restricted it to Blue items or better, which is a general indication of better gear than others that are green rewards. Stick to Mail Armor so you get the hunter mail bonus too.
http://www.wowhead.com/items?filter=qu=3;sl=5;minrl=78;maxrl=82;ub=3;cr=21:18;crs=1:1;crv=0:0
Once you get the items listed, sort on the Agility column and go to town. I'd stick with focusing on agi (after you are hit capped at 8%; feel free to ask if you don't know how to do that) until you get to 85, then you can learn about the other stats like crit and haste and such. i know a leather piece is listed first in that list above, so I'd eliminate it and came up with http://www.wowhead.com/item=59608
When you click on that item, you can see where it is rewarded from (the quest name) and by clicking on that quest, it can also tell you if it's part of a quest chain, where to pick it up from, and assist you with how to do the quests.
There, now no hunter need be naked….
…unless we like to bee. 🙂
Wow, that's a bunch of great advice.
Thank you all - I really do appreciate it.
I added some gear I got from quests last night, I'll have to go back and double check it, they were tough decisions, but I made them on armor instead of agility so I'll have to look again. It's very difficult sometimes because some other the rating you want go up if you switch the piece of gear and others go down - I'm never sure what to do when I'm looking at adding 100 armor points and losing 20 agility points.
I will look to the AH (took me a few minutes to figure that one out) to replace some of my lower level stuff, and hit the wowhead link to look for specific items, then hit those quests.
As far as the pets go, I keep forgetting to maintain them (add points, bring their levels up). I'll sit down and do it though, I want to redistribute my points anyway as I now see the patterns people use applying 31 points to their primary and the rest to the two other areas.
I don't know why, but I like the idea of inscription, and how stupid is it that I keep forgetting to make glyphs for me, but that is where I've been making my money, by selling glyphs - like you said there's people leveling alts and they want glyphs too.
Niika - you said to ask if I didn't know how to hit cap at 8%, so I'm asking.
I also appreciate the work you did with the link.
I've got a lot of work to do and I'm excited about it - thank you all for inspiring me.
Elus-the Queen Bee herself is apparently back from rehab and has stepped in so now you're in ridiculously good hands.
You are always better off to take a piece of gear (only mail of course) with the +20 Agility over the +100 Armor. We are a ranged weapon class, so we want to avoid getting in close and getting beat on by anything. Your primary stats as a hunter are agility, agility, more agility and then stamina. Once you get some better gear, you can come on back and explore the magic of reforging etc to reach the hit cap (if the quest equipment doesn't give it to you-it should). It's about at that point your head may explode with info. Please get pics if it does.
Now pets are the biggest thing us Hunters have going for us (aside from our innate coolness) and contribute enormously to our class , hell they are the class, so you definitely want to be speccing those out:) And yes, Glyphs for yourself are important:) Not sure what Glyph, ask. Same with your build n pet build.
As for profs, if you like inscription you keep doing it. This is afterall but a game for all excluding Ozolin. He's obsessed with gazing into the waters of Azeroth to see his reflection. Why I heard once Blizzard put his account on inactive because he got frozen while primping at a lake. Frozen three weeks rumor has it. I know, I started the rumor 🙂
I wish there was a scoreboard that showed exactly how much better looking I am than everyone else. Then, after reading Agio's hurtful comments I could simply point at the scoreboard and chant, "SCOOORRRREEEE BOOOAAARDDDD"
Winning.
Also, for Elusepher- totally agree that you should take the higher +AGI gear over the higher Armor score gear. When you start Reforging your gear (can you Reforge before lvl 85?) you'll be able to move points from lesser stats, like Mastery, into better ones, like Crit or Haste AND you'll be able to more precisely siphon off any extra Hit and get as close to 8% without going under as possible.
I have nothing productive to add this thread - busy wiping the tears away reading Agio and Niikas Ozzolicious comments.
Winning.
When you race solo, Oz darling, you are always a winner.
…come to think of it, you are also a ________
/winks, ducks, and runs.
Elus… thank you for asking. Once you find it, it will be a "oh THAT's what that is!" kind of moment… Gar has one of the best explanations anywhere for hit rating, how to find it, etc, at https://huntsmanslodge.com/5869/hit-rating/ Basically, the percentage comes from rolling your mouse over your Hit Rating on your stats chart in game. If you go to your Wow armory page, it is plainly listed as a percentage, with the number of points available in mouseover. I know bass-ackwards, but they let Ozzolucious (like the twist there) program that page in game and well… let's just say Agio was out to lunch and couldn't make the correction.
I hope that helps - your hit rating is just above 1% currently, so I would anticipate you may be seeing a lot of floating "Misses" when you are shooting (unlike the 'floating missus' you see after a few too many of Gar's Brews.
Hey, that really needs to be a pandaren monk hunter ago boost drink. GHOSTCRAWLER LISTEN TO ME!!!!!