survival

Another Reason I Went Back to Beast Mastery for PvP

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Bone Spider

Bleh… no way am I going to roll with that as a pet.

Spider is one of the few pet types I’ve never used. For one, they used to suck up until Blizzard gave them their Web ability. Second, they just never remotely appealed to me as far as looks are concerned. Also, my wife’s not afraid of too much, but one thing that freaks her out more than almost anything are Black Widows. I’m sure she’d just love having me show up with my new creepy companion when helping her out with a group quest in Icecrown. 😈

Anyway, when I was playing around with MM for a bit in arena, I decided to say screw it… I’m gonna get me a spider. So what if I don’t like how they look, and too bad if my wife gets grossed out as she peers over my shoulder and sees me running round with this horrific thing in arena. After all, it’s just a bunch of pixels… it’s not real.

So, I moseyed over to Icecrown to locate me a level 80 Necrotic Webspinner. Alas, I found one, landed, then sat there… A few moments later I came to this conclusion…

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Taking One for the Team

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Nuramoc

Ironic huh… Only a few short weeks have passed since I swore off Beast Mastery, yet here I am returning to my beloved PvP spec.

This time’s it’s business though. A few guildies and I started a 3s team mainly for fun, but after getting our asses handed to us the other night, it wasn’t so much “fun” for me anymore. My healer is new to arena, and is still working on his game and his gear. Meanwhile, he’s been having a terrible time trying to keep me up, as I’m the opposing team’s focus-fire target about 99.9% of the time.

I tried Marksmanship out for about a dozen matches and had similar results to that of Survival. My survivability was about the same, burst and Readiness were awesome, but it didn’t really seem to be the answer for us. If I were an elite Hunter I suppose I would be able to lead us to 2200 and beyond, but “elite” I am not. I’m pretty good, but unless I have fairly strong teammates, I’m not going to be able to do anything spectacular.

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My Survival Guide to Surviving in PvP as a Survival Hunter: Part Two

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Welcome to part two of my Survival Hunter PvP guide. The purpose of this two part post is to offer up some basic tips and suggestions for those new to Survival Huntering, a quick-start-guide if you will. After a lengthy career as primarily a BM PvP Hunter, I’ve made the transition to Survival pretty easily, and I’m here to help you do so as well.

In part one I covered my talent build, pet choice & pet spec, glyphs, enchants and gear itemization. The purpose of that post was to offer a brief overview of the spec and to help better optimize your toon for success in BGs or arena.

In part two, my goal is to provide you with a few tips and pointers on getting the most out of your new build and play style. This post will not be an all encompassing guide on “How to Own as a Survival Hunter”, but more of a primer to get you up and running. In this part of the guide, I’ll give you an overview of the basic PvP shot selection, Survival Hunter mechanics, as well as show you some useful addons and macros.

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Patch 3.3 aka the “Pet Buff Patch”

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Blizzard released some updated patch notes for Patch 3.3 today. Wow… there are some amazing changes in store for Hunters, both for PvE and PvP. Let’s discuss these things shall we… First off, pets will now be inheriting 100% of their master’s resilience. That is an absolute godsend for Hunter PvP. Along with a few of the other changes being …

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My Survival Guide to Surviving in PvP as a Survival Hunter: Part One

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Say that five times fast…

I’ve specced Survival for PvP in the past, but never for very long. However, once BM was laid to rest last week, I decided to jump ship and become an explosives expert. Since there may be other displaced BM PvPers like myself, I figured I’d provide a glimpse at my spec, as well as share some of what little knowledge I possess concerning Survival Huntering in the realm of player versus player combat. 😉

Keep in mind that I’m not an elite PvPer. I’m decent and I’m competitive, but I am in no way an authority on hardcore Hunter PvP. I usually do pretty well in both BGs and arena, but I am always out looking for ways to step my game up. Although I’m feeling a lot smoother with it this go ’round, I’ve never remained Survival for more than a few weeks. If anyone has any advice or constructive criticism pertaining to this post, macro suggestions, tactics, and especially arena strategies, then please share.

Well let’s get started…

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