Ela's Guide to Hunter Skills Part 1

(This guide was created by Elakuan, level 70 troll hunter, of the server Vashj. All credit is due to him for this wonderful guide. Date: 04/21/2007)



I’ve talked a lot about specs and gear in my posts. Others talk about shot rotations, and pet choices. All of these things are important. But that isn’t all it takes to be a great hunter. A LOT of skill is involved…more than is appreciated from the outside. This guide is intended for those who are trying to step up their game, from the intermediate to advanced levels. Already an experience hunter? There’s maybe a trick or two in here that makes it still worth the read. And maybe you can teach me a few of yours for later addition to the guide (and so I can step up MY game).



Anyhoo.



Enjoy. 1. Chain Trapping – With changes to the survival tree and even hunter gear, traps are more now a part of the game than ever. Chain trapping (keeping a single mob trapped forever) isn’t hard, but if it goes wrong all hell can break loose, so it bears mentioning here. The key is to be ahead of your cooldown cycle. Put down your trap BEFORE the pull begins (30 seconds) so that when you pull your mob into the trap, you already have another one ready to go. If it resists, don’t panic, drop another trap…after all you have another ready. If not, put one down immediately anyway. Not right on top of him, that doesn’t work, but in front of it. Place yourself on the other side of the trap and put your arrows into your main target. When the trap breaks and retraps, repeat.



If you don’t have both a 2-piece beastlord set and the survival talents to increase trap duration, then the mob will slowly catch up to your cooldowns, until you’re placing your traps JUST as his breaks. This is why you lay your trap early…so you have room to breathe.



If something goes wrong, and it often does, you have two options. First, kite him (see more on kiting below). Second, feign death. Often some combination of the two is necessary, but your responsibility IF you fd is to pick him back up and put him in the trap. FD only to get the distance you need to have your trap cooldown ready.



A third option, particularly if you’re double-trapping (below) or know your cooldown isn’t going to cut it, is to trap your mob and get to the other side of the room before killing your main target. Then when the trap breaks, your mob has ground to cover…and you have time to get a bit of your cooldown back before he gets to you.



If these skills are at all foreign to you, practice while you level/farm. Purposefully aggro two mobs, keep one chain trapped as you kill one and pull the next mob. As is true in all skills in this guide, you don’t want to be figuring this out in an instance. You should be an expert by then. 2.



2. Double Trapping – This is where you impress your friends. Select two mobs ahead of time (someone should be marking). Lay down a trap, wait for your cooldown to be up (as you would if you were chain trapping). After the tank pulls, shoot your first target. He will come toward you. Immediately switch to the next target, and aggro it as well. The first mob will trap…after it does, lay another trap at your feet, trapping the other one. Take a moment to /flex, kill the skull.





Educate your tanks about this. The FIRST mob is his next target. You will be unable to retrap both…so stick to the second target, which you should be able to chain trap. A great way to do it with a tank you’re comfortable with is to run up to the setup point for the next pull, lay down a trap, say, “this is yours…whatever you trap in there is yours to pick up when the trap fades.” When your tank gets used to that, he’ll love it. Its like a free 30 seconds for him where he doesn’t need to double tank, while you still have your own mob under control. And you can lay your trap before drinking while he sets up. Your mana restores as you eat up your trap cooldown.



3. Jump Shot – This is fundamental for hunters at all levels. Jump, and with your right mouse button held down, spin yourself around. For a moment, you’ll be flying backwards through the air, and can fire any instant shot from the air before landing and starting up your shot sequence. You may prefer to change the mouse turn speed in your interface options to maximize your precision. Especially when you graduate to…



4. Advanced Jump Shot – This adds a step to the end of the Jump Shot – turning back around before landing...and continuing to run in the same direction. So you get off a shot without missing a step. Master the first version before learning this one. You can do it without even letting go of the right mouse button, just jump, spin halfway, fire, and spin back. You may need an alternate key binding for your instant shots (in my case I put arcane shot on F and conc shot on R).



5. Kiting – With this skill nailed you can now provide a very valuable skill to your group. Start by laying down a frost (slowing) trap. Turn on aspect of the cheetah. Aimed shot, conc shot, arcane shot the mob. Run away until it hits your frost trap, then arcane shot and serpent sting the mob. Squeeze in other shots as you can, but don’t push it – you should have aggro now. Turn and run away. Use your LEFT mouse button as you need to turn the camera and check the mob’s distance from you. Advanced Jump Shot every time conc shot or arcane shot are available, and serpent sting whenever you can…and frost traps as well. In this fashion you can pull a mob a long distance before Feigning Death to let it return to your group.



The easiest ways for a kite to fail are letting the mob get too close (forcing you to feign death and wipe all that aggro you built up), not getting enough threat established (which means your healers pull the aggro back), and quite simply…not planning your route (so you hit a wall and the mob closes the gap). Practice your skills on elite mobs in the wild. If you do it right, they’ll never touch you.



6. Advanced Kiting –

Variation 1: The World’s Best Frost Trap: If the mob you are kiting is vulnerable to frost traps (a Coilfang Defender in Slave Pens, for instance) you can take this to the next level. Kite him traditionally for a bit, then when you get a fresh frost trap down, blow rapid fire, burn him as hard as you can as he crosses the trap, then feign death. Come back up immediately, and begin firing as he crosses the frost trap again (to go after your healer) and gets stuck in it AGAIN. If you time it right, you can regain aggro as he gets through the trap…and he’ll come to you, hitting your trap AGAIN. (yes, that’s 3 times he’s hit the same trap!) At this point, turn and kite him the traditional way until you have feign death and frost trap up. With a lot of practice, by the time your group says, “Ok, bring him back,” he’ll be dead. And you will be a hero to your tribe. Don’t forget to /flex. This is a hard variation, because it takes someone with aggro to practice. Bring a friend to work on this in the wild before trying it in an instance.



Variation 2: Multiple mob kiting: This one is particularly useful for the last pull in Slave Pens, with 2 defenders and 2 other mobs. (“No worries guys, I can kite both defenders.”) Lay down an explosive trap, wait for the cooldown to burn. Aimed Shot one defender, arcane shot the other, and run. They will both hit the trap (more aggro) and then you put another explosive trap down. Then jump shot kite the second one (which you arcane shotted). No time to stop here with two of them on you, but once your frost trap cooldown is up you can risk a few shots on the other mob. Or…don’t, and let that one return back to your group (it’ll go for the healer) while you finish off the other one yourself by switching to variation 1.



Combine these two variations and you’ll be able to kite 3 in heroic shattered halls (and you’ll need to with pulls up to 8 large.) Multi-shot, double explosive trap, run. Frost trap, multishot, feign death, (wait for them to hit trap again) multishot (pull them back over the trap again), run, explosive trap. Or, go completely insane and have another hunter misdirect to you while you do it and kite 6.



(Side Note: Anyone who thinks being a hunter is boring needs to step up his game.)