WoW Reviews & Guides

Hunter’s Role in a group

A Hunter can fulfill one of many Group Roles. Primarily, the Hunter is called to be a puller, an off tank, sustained DPS provider, pseudo wipe recoverer, and crowd controller.

General

• Watch your pet. Your pet should almost always be set on Passive mode. Growl’s autocast should be turned off, and if you have a boar, Charge’s autocast generally should be as well, since the skill is bugged and will break Crowd Control if present.

The biggest dangers a pet can pose is when chasing after runners (make sure you call your pet back when a mob begins to run) and when jumping off of cliffs. When you jump off a cliff or a ledge, your pet will take the long way and will trigger every mob on the way and bring it to you and your group (note that this only applies when you drop onto a ledge accessible by another route; in the case of a ledge only accessible by dropping from above, the pet will drop down with you). When you need to jump off a ledge, either dismiss your pet or use Eyes of the Beast to force your pet to jump off. Better yet, put your pet on stay and move forward yourself, calling your pet again once it is out of range. This allows you to avoid the happiness penalty normally incurred by using the Dismiss spell. Let your group know that you will be watching your pet.

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The hunter class performs pulling, threat redirection, crowd control, and primarily ranged damage. Hunters have pets that add to their DPS and help manage aggro. They can also track, tame and train animals and beasts found in the wild. The well trained pet, on countless occasions, has saved a hunter’s life. It has been said by many, and throughout history, that hunters consider their weapons and pets to be their only true friends.

In some other games, such as Everquest, the hunter is a ranged/melee hybrid that can rely on both, when the need arises. In World of Warcraft, this is generally not the case. The survival tree offers some enhancement to melee ability, but the class’s damage mitigation is poor compared to most pure melee classes and its melee abilities are generally considered too limited to be a practical source of DPS. For this reason, a hunter’s melee attack is typically a last resort used only when his pet cannot keep threat on itself.

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Kael’thas Sunstrider, Lord of the Blood Elves, is the fourth and final boss encounter of the Eye. He is accompanied by his council of four advisors: Thaladred the Darkener, Master Engineer Telonicus, Grand Astromancer Capernian and Lord Sanguinar. He spawns seven powerful legendary items which you have to fight, defeat and then equip in order to defeat Kael’thas. These items are usable only during the encounter; reseting the encounter, wiping, or releasing to the graveyard will cause them to desummon.

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Void Reaver is the second boss in the Eye of Tempest Keep. It is a Fel Reaver guardian. Since it is a rather simple fight (probably easier than High King Maulgar or Prince Malchezaar), it has earned the nickname “Loot Reaver.” The only pre-condition is that the raid’s total DPS be high enough to kill it prior to its enrage (after 10 minutes).

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Hex Lord Malacrass, a witch doctor, is the second to last boss within Zul’Aman. Looking to annihilate the existence of all elves, Malacrass had devised a similar plan to that of the blood elves, who had channeled the power of Light into their own ranks. He, instead, sealed the power of the animal gods within the bodies of the Amani’s strongest warriors. Zul’jin quickly approved the plan and lent his full support. Malacrass experimented tirelessly and succeeded in imbuing four warriors with the essence of mighty animal gods and eventually lead to the rise of Zul’Aman.

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Jan’alai, the Amani lord of dragonhawks, is the third animal boss within Zul’Aman. He holds Kraz captive in a cage near his platform, awaiting his sacrifice if the raid cannot rescue him before the timer runs out. Defeating Jan’alai with time remaining does not add any additional time but still allows the raid to free Kraz. He will, in turn, reward the raid with access to a small share of gold and unlock Kraz’s Package which will contain an epic ring.

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As many of you know from panels at last year’s BlizzCon and posts here on the forums since then, Cataclysm will bring about major changes to familiar character stats such as Intellect, Armor Penetration, Defense, and others, ultimately designed to make the effects of stats more easily understandable and make gear choices more interesting. As these changes will have a significant impact on how stats work and relate to one another, today we wanted to offer you a closer look at exactly what’s in store and explain some of the rationale before Cataclysm arrives.

The most obvious question these changes raise is “Why are stats being changed, and why now?” As the game has matured, we’ve run into increasingly complex issues with the current stat system. Many stats are inherently confusing, and the way they interrelate can feel convoluted. Attack Power, for example, currently translates to damage, but so does Armor Penetration. Defense provides five different statistical benefits of varying utility. Mana regeneration involves understanding multiple stats and rules and often ends up being irrelevant anyway. In addition, the difference between a “good stat” for a class and a “bad stat” can be extreme. Some casters want Haste but not Crit; hunters want Armor Penetration but not Haste. There are other overarching issues, as well, such as Intellect not being very exciting for casters despite it being a core stat — and these are just a few examples.

Our ultimate goal is make gear a more interesting (and less confusing) choice by making each stat valuable to more players. While the reasoning behind some of the following changes may be clear, we understand that you may have questions about some of the less obvious alterations, and we’ll do our best to answer any questions you may have here on the forums.
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Welcome to the World of Warcraft: Cataclysm beta test! Patch notes listed here are not comprehensive and will be changed throughout the testing process.

General

• The Alliance starting experience for worgen is available. Venture through the cursed lands of Gilneas to discover your true path! Currently the female worgen character is not available for testing.
• The Horde starting experience for goblins is available. Beginning on the Isle of Kezan in a goblin paradise, players will face a treacherous road ahead!
• The level cap for all characters is 83.
• Players may use our Character Copy feature for copying existing characters to beta realms, or may choose from high-level pre-made template characters.

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There are a lot of classes in WoW that excel at PvP. Mages, however, are usually considered one of the least PvP suited classes. This, of course, is not true. While many will say that the only true way to PvP a mage would be a deep frost talent build. True, the frost tree is indeed excellent for snaring opponents and improving your survivability. Fire and Arcane builds, mixes or otherwise, can also be effectively used as well. It’s arguable that PvP specialized mages must have good gear. This is true of any class but a lot of PvP also depends on the player’s skill and ability to react to the challenges brought in PvP. Naturally, better gear will give your character more potency but playing battlegrounds and arenas will bring about better gear, specifically PvP suited gear.

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Marwyn, Arthas Menethil’s second captain during his life as a paladin, is the second boss in the Halls of Reflection. He will engage the party after the 9th spirit wave has been defeated.

Marwyn becomes active on the tenth and final wave of the gauntlet of ghosts spawned to block intruders (which are also based on Human units from Warcraft III), and must be defeated in order to proceed to the Shadow Throne.

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