Hunter Solo Strategies and Tactics

Solo Strategies and Tactics

The general strategy for a Hunter is combat at range. This section will refer to PvE battles, not PvP.

General Strategy

The general strategy for a Hunter in solo play involves set up and kiting. As a pet class, a Hunter has a somewhat unique challenge present in solo play, in that he/she must carefully monitor their generation of threat. This can be done using the addon Omen3.

If the threat being generated by the Hunter exceeds that generated by the pet, the attention of the mob being attacked may be diverted from the pet to the Hunter, and the mob may then move into the Hunter's melee range.

If this occurs, the Hunter is then forced to either rely on her vestigial melee abilities to kill the mob, or to use the Feign Death ability to cause the mob to return to the pet. Given that Feign Death is not learned until level 30, it is of vital importance to new Hunters to begin to learn threat management as early as possible.

As Feign Death is not only on a 30 second cooldown, but is also prone to failure on occasion, the ability to regulate threat is a vital skill, which will serve a Hunter well throughout the entirety of their career.

Normal

Initially apply an Aspect if necessary: Aspect of the Hawk for optimal damage, Aspect of the Monkey if you expect melee, and Aspect of the Viper (at level 64 and higher) to regenerate mana to support an aggressive shot rotation.

For Single Targets:-

Apply Hunter's Mark.
Drop an Immolation Trap at roughly 15 yards from the target, if you can measure it. The addon RangeDisplay is invaluable for this. This also becomes partly intuitive with experience.
Use Arcane Shot (Rank 1) as an initial low threat pull shot.
Apply Mend Pet pre-emptively so it is active while the pet engages the target.
Time sending the pet so that it reaches the mob when the mob reaches the Immolation Trap. Ideally this macro can be used to combine both applying Hunter's Mark and sending the pet at once.
Jump backwards 4-5 times to re-establish maximum range.
Apply Serpent Sting. The use of Serpent Sting and Immolation Trap in conjunction is mathematically verifiable as the most mana-efficient method a Hunter has for killing individual mobs, although it is somewhat slow.[1]
Commence fire with Auto Shot or another (preferably fairly low powered, so low threat) rotation of choice until the target is dead.

For Multiple Targets:-

If there are other mobs nearby and you only wish to pull one, use Arcane Shot Rank 1 as a pull shot to minimise aggro, and lead the mob to a safe distance away from the others. Determining safe pulls is one of the primary tasks of a Hunter, in both group and solo scenarios, but grows easier with experience.
Set a Freezing Trap if multiple targets are expected and you wish to freeze one. Alternatively, Snake Trap can be used to distract one target while the other is being fought.
Apply Hunter's Mark.
Apply Mend Pet if necessary.
Send Pet.
Attack from range with Auto-Shot, special shots like Aimed Shot, or a Sting.
Once the untrapped mob is dead, redirect the pet to the trapped mob.
Re-apply Mend Pet if necessary.
Feign Death to clear any residual aggro.
Jump backwards once or twice to acquire range, and to give the pet a moment to establish aggro.
Apply Serpent Sting, and continue fire until the target is dead.

The reason to let the pet attack first is to establish aggro. This allows you to stay at range, where you are much more effective; hunter ranged damage is significantly higher than melee damage. Generally, the use of traps is reserved for special situations such as when you are expecting to pull multiple mobs. In that case, set a Freezing Trap and then send the pet in to establish aggro on your preferred target. Once the pet has activated the mobs use Multi-Shot to aggro the add and pull it over the trap to immobilize it. Alternatively, the healing aggro from Mend Pet can pull the add off your pet and straight into your trap. You can dispense with the trap if your pet is strong enough to take the hits from multiple mobs. Do not DoT a mob you intend to trap.

Kiting

Kiting is a concept that all Hunters should learn. Most Hunters will find it unnecessary until later levels, and might never use it if they never tackle hard battles. The basic premise of kiting is keeping your range while dealing damage. The generic way it's done is like this:-

Snare or root mob using a ranged ability
Use ranged attacks until mob enters melee range
Snare or root mob using a melee snare
Run to range
Turn around, and go to step 1

To be Hunter specific:-

Concussive Shot the mob from as far away as you can get
Use your Stings, Arcane Shot, Multishot, and Auto shot as much as possible until the mob enters your melee range
Keep on using Wing Clip until it hits and applies its effect. If you have Counterattack and you have it available to you, this is even better.
Run to range
Go to step 1, but use a Jump Shot to fire off the Concussive Shot.

If the mob is too strong for the melee Wing Clip:-

Start by putting Hunter's Mark on the mob you want to kite
Put on Aspect of the Cheetah for an extra run speed boost
If you can, start pulling the mob using Aimed Shot at maximum range
Use Concussive Shot to slow the mob
Use Arcane Shot and Serpent Sting
Run away from the mob and try to stay at max range at all times
When you are at max range you can stand and shoot with Auto Shot so you don't use mana (also good when you run out of mana while kiting), you can also shoot off a Jump Shot with the Arcane Shot
Keep doing step 4-7 until the mob is dead

Remember:- Be sure before you pull that you have a safe run path so you don't get other mobs while kiting. If the mob is running faster than you, or you can no way get far enough away to kite this way, or there is no path you can kite on, you may need the help of a group instead.

Kiting Bosses in Instances When kiting bosses in instances, it is important that the mob doesn't strike you. This can be achieved by using Aspect of the Cheetah, but to avoid the daze effect of being struck, it is best to stay out of melee range. As with any kiting, this can be achieved by shifting the camera by holding down the right mouse button and dragging either to the left or the right. If you drag by about 45 degrees, it will allow you to maintain your forward momentum in approximately the same direction, and allow you to use instant cast abilities such as Arcane Shot, Concussive Shot and Serpent's Sting to make sure the boss keeps following you, but not get close enough to hit you. This would be of particular use when you need to pull a boss away from a large group of mobs that would come to its aid if you attempted to attack it directly.

See also: Jump-Kiting, Skirmish Kiting and Kiting in instances

PvE Tips

Watch your pet's health. If your pet dies, the mob(s) will then go after you. In your pet does die, attempt to kite the mob.
Watch your ammo supply as you will be much less effective if forced into melee.
If the mob has a powerful attack that uses mana, consider using Viper Sting. Silencing Shot can be effective as well.
If the mob has a magical buff use an Arcane Shot.

Many of the tactics on this page are pre-BC. All hunters should take advantage of the powerful benefits of Steady Shot. Steady Shot has a casting time of 1.5 seconds and does not reset your auto-shot timer. This means that Hunters can fire Steady Shots while waiting for their next auto-shot to be ready. Depending on the speed of the Hunter's ranged weapon, multiple Steady Shots may be able to be fired before the auto-shot is ready. It is important to keep an eye on the auto-shot cooldown, as the casting of a Steady Shot will prevent an auto-shot from being fired. This is called "clipping", and will decrease DPS.

Traps

There are five different traps available to the hunter. A trap skill allows you to set a trap on the ground which will stay put for 1 minute, and will activate when a mob comes within range, performing their designated function. Since patch 2.0.1, traps CAN be placed while in combat, so running through a mob your pet is tanking while dropping a trap is now a possible tactic.

Freezing Trap is used for crowd control. It can immobilize a target for up to 26 seconds with talents. Good hunters should know how to chain-trap a mob for 4-5 times with this ability. See Freezing Trap#Raid.
Immolation Trap is used for added damage to a single target.
Frost Trap is used to slow down multiple mobs, one possible use is if you know you will lose the fight because of too many mobs drop one and flee. Given that it does no damage to mobs, or provide any other effects, it should probably not be used in most cases, with preference given primarily to Snake Trap, (due to mana efficiency, the snare effect, and the snakes having their own aggro table) or Explosive Trap, which can still do a reasonable amount of damage, especially when stacked with Serpent Sting.
Explosive Trap is good for hitting multiple mobs. Note that you may pull aggro from the mob not engaged by your pet. Good to put aggro on additional mobs to protect Priest
Snake Trap available after level 68 is good when multiple mobs are encountered for the many effects it has.

Stings

Serpent Sting - This is the sting you want to use to deal the most damage and bring the mob down the quickest. Its high mana cost/damage causes many hunters to avoid it if mana conservation is necessary.
Scorpid Sting - This sting is the Hunter's main debuff. It will help keep tanks alive longer. Another very important use of Scorpid Sting is to cancel the effect of Serpent Sting and Viper Sting for when the Hunter wants to stop the Damage over Time effect (so Freezing Trap or Scatter Shot isn't broken).
Viper Sting - This is the Hunter's main anti-caster sting. The usefulness is debatable. In PvP, many caster classes can either efficiently cleanse the debuff or kill the Hunter before the sting drains enough mana. Viper Sting can be effective on targets with small mana pools (such as Hunters, Paladins and Shamans). Serpent Sting may be better against caster mobs because of their low health.
Wyvern Sting is only available through talents. It will put a mob to sleep for 12 seconds. Upon waking, the mob takes X damage over 12 seconds. Great way to interrupt a caster or short CC an add. Due to the DoT the mob will not be able to be re-CCed unless Scorpid Sting is applied after the mob breaks the sleep effect.

The Hunter Shot Cycle

At level 62, Hunters learn Steady Shot. Upon learning this shot, the Hunter's shot rotation will change drastically. Steady Shot has a 1.5 second cast timer, and certain weapon speeds will be optimal for hunter specs: Beast Master hunters desire fast weapons because of Serpent's Swiftness(they want to have a speed of 1.6) and Marksman/Survival hunters want slightly slow weapons.

At lower levels, the Hunter's shot rotation centered around Arcane Shot

Arcane Shot is instant attack, but it has a 6 second cooldown (5 seconds with talents).
Steady Shot takes 1.5 sec to cast but has no cooldown.

This means that a new rotation is possible. For example, if a hunter uses a ranged weapon with 1.6 sec attack speed:

Hunter casts auto shot.(1.6)
Hunter casts Steady Shot.(1.5)
Auto shot is ready.(1.6)

So your auto shot comes 0.1 sec after your steady shot.

Now imagine that the Hunter uses ranged weapon with a 3 sec attack speed:

Hunter casts auto shot.
Hunter casts Steady Shot.
Hunter casts Steady Shot.
Auto shot is ready.

These examples assume that there is no lag and the Hunter has perfect reflexes; in reality, a Hunter will not likely be able to cast two Steady Shots between an auto shot using a 3.0 weapon.

Some Hunters choose Arcane Shot over Steady Shot because Arcane Shot is not affected by armor. However, the way to maximize DPS is to work up a shot rotation. For a BM hunter, the rotation is typically 1:1. This means one Steady Shot per auto shot. For Marksman/Survival hunters, the rotation depends on the speed of the weapon. Their rotations typically include Arcane Shot as well as Steady Shot.

Melee

Hunters are an interesting class because of how they do damage. They are the only class that can efficiently use ranged weapons, yet are forced into melee quite often until taming a pet at level 10. Common wisdom is that Hunters should never melee. For the most part this is true; Hunters will do far less damage in melee and can be a liability to parties. However, it is important to keep melee weapon skills high for a couple of skills:

Wing Clip relies on hitting the mob.
Disengage relies on hitting the mob.

If you PvP a lot, weapon skills should be capped. This will ensure that Wing Clips hit as often as possible. Also, if you're rooted in melee, you can get off a couple of Raptor Strikes before escaping.

Another consideration is the Defense skill. A competent hunter can keep mobs at range nearly all of the time. This keeps the hunter from being hit by melee attacks, but also keeps his Defense skill from increasing. If the Hunter's Defense falls too far behind, mobs will always crit him.

The important thing to remember is to not melee while in instances unless absolutely necessary. Your group invited you to DPS, not skill up polearms.

Hunter Dance

Since a few patches ago, the minimum range of ranged weapons has been reduced to equal the maximum melee range, thus removing the "dead zone". This has made it possible to perform a movement that alternates melee and ranged attacks increasing the DPS while conserving your mana in very short-range fights. This movement has been called by some the "hunter dance". This hunter dance is well known as a good way to skill up any weapon skill, as you're getting as many weapon swings while still killing mobs faster, ie rendering your skilling more useful.

NON AGGRO DANCE:
This is the easiest and basic version, and is performed when the targeted mob is attacking someone else.
Basically, the hunter stays at the limit between ranged and melee zones and steps in and out to alternate the two kinds of attack. Since the two weapons are independent the hunter can use them both at the same time: this means that while your auto shot is loading its next shot you will be able to step forward, start an auto-swing, and step backwards into ranged zone. Just shoot your auto-shot and as soon as you hear the bow's/gun's sound step forward into melee range, then as soon as the swing animation starts step back again. This is possible since you only need to be in melee range for a split-second to deliver your auto swing, even if you're already out of range when you actually see the swing animation.

AGGRO DANCE:
This is the harder but more useful version of the dance. When a non-caster mob is attacking you, either because you got the aggro over your pet, or your pet's dead or otherwise occupied, it will be the enemy to try and come within melee range. In this situation you will only step backwards to get in the ranged zone, and the enemy himself will follow you to get your auto swing.
The mob must be constantly wing-clipped or otherwise slowed down, since you'll usually need more than a step backwards to be able to auto-shoot; freezing trap or serpent's venom should also work fine. While aggro-dancing you'll wanto to use the aspect of the monkey and be ready to mongoose bite.

When dancing instant shoots can be used, while raptor strike is to be avoided for it is possible to toggle it after the auto swing, thus stopping all other attacks until it has triggered. No need to say that the dance is useless against most bosses that have special attacks which will make you prefer to fight from as far as possible.
The best choice would be to have such ranged and melee weapons that their final attack speed is equal: e.g. if the final speed (modified by quiver and talents) of your bow/gun is 2.4s you would get the best results using a melee weapon with the same speed, which would result in alternate attacks at a rate of roughly 1.2s. If the speeds of your weapons are different you would have to wait for the slower one to activate, slowing down the other one's cycle.
Actually as a BM hunter with RAspeed about 2s and a slow 2Hweapon (more than 3s) the difference in speed is so high that dps is better if i use 2 shots between each melee attack, and this can only be performed in the non-aggro version. If you can get a feeling with the dance and want to use it at high levels you may want to use 1-h weapons instead.

Dual Wielding vs Two Handed Weapons

There are arguments for both. The damage output is pretty similar overall due to the miss rate of the offhand of a dual wielder.

Dual Wielding
PvP
Dual Wielding for a hunter can be considered foolish because most people advise that hunters stay out of melee combat. However, in PvP everyone knows that the hunter's greatest ability is his ranged attacks; Kiting can be difficult for a hunter because the opponent will try to close range. In skirmishes involving multiple opponents it can be difficult to use and Freeze Traps because your allies may not expect your attempt at crowd control and use DoTs or AoE abilities that will break the trap.

Dual wielding weapons may make you more efficient in melee combat because you are dealing damage more quickly. This can be effective in delaying casting time. Another perk of dual wielding is that you can get two enchants. The main concern is the inherent miss chance of dual wielding.

It could arguably be good to have two weapons with melee bonuses when forced out of range. For example, the [Hanzo Sword] has a damage proc. When rooted in melee, the Hunter could switch weapons and use a melee-centric set until he has gotten back into range. This is a viable tactic since weapons and shields are the only equipment that you can change when you are in combat.

Two Handed Weapon
PvP
The biggest argument for a hunter to use a two handed weapon in PvP is that Raptor Strike is based on weapon damage. At only 2 talent points into the survival talent tree you can buff your chance to crit with Raptor Strike and Mongoose Bite by 20% which makes it fairly potent. If you are skilled at kiting you will usually only use Raptor Strike and Wing Clip as players find their way to you. The point of kiting players in PvP is to only get in one melee hit before retreating to range again. This means that it would be better to have a weapon that hits harder, even if it is much slower.

The [Barbarous Blade] is an example of a good high level two-handed weapon. Notice the base damage is fairly high and that it buffs critical chance and attack power.

PvE
Throughout most of the game, it is better to use a two-handed weapon. They're cheaper both to purchase and to enchant, and also typically have stats more useful to hunters. One-handed weapons often have stats that favor rogues over hunters. This is especially true end game, as nearly all hunter melee weapons are two-handed.

Pet combat tactics

There are as many schools of thought about this subject as there are Hunters. Some say send the pet to initiate the pull and the fight. Some contend that it's best if the Hunter initiates the fight with a sting or concussive shot. Experiment until you find a method that works for your play style and use that as your unique way of dealing with Azeroth's enemies.

The main thought to keep in mind here is that you need to keep your pet fed, healthy and happy. The more your pets' happiness drops, the less effective they are in combat. An interesting irony here is that the more you fight with your pet, the more it's happiness drops as well -- you simply can't win with pets, can you? ;)

You also need to ensure that you've taught your pet every ability you have at your disposal that its pet-class can use. If you haven't learned all the available pet abilities, go to the nearest pet trainer and see if they have any available for you to learn. Then stable your current pet and tame a pet that has the abilities you're missing. Take the new pet out fighting, and after a few battles you will receive a message in your General Log indicating you've learned a new skill, for example, Prowl Rank 3 or Bite Rank 6. Abandon the new pet, unstable your main pet and teach them the new abilities using his available training points.

If you follow these simple guidelines, your pet should always be combat-ready. So go out and find a mob and repeat the strategies and tactics that work for you!

Managing your Pet

You can instruct your pet how to react enemies in three different ways - Aggressive, Defensive or Passive. The icons for each stance are found on the right of your pet's skill bar.

Extreme care should be used when using Aggressive as your pet will automatically attack any enemies within close range of it. This can result in your pet initiating fights continuously in busy areas before you've had a chance to stop and recover from a previous fight. Using this setting in a party will quickly result in unpopularity as your pet keeps the fight going before the group can recover from a difficult encounter. Most hunters would not use Aggressive very often, if at all! Aggressive stance is best used for:

Detecting and reacting to stealthed or prowling enemies quickly. An aggressive pet will turn and face any stealthed players it detects. An aggressive pet will begin attacking a stealther at any provocation.
Fighting large groups of enemy players or mobs. An aggressive pet uses a threat list just like any other monster and will focus on whoever is creating the most aggro (usually due to damage dealt to you or your party, but possibly from threat abilities), using your pet as a main assist is an easy way to prioritize targets. Be careful in battle grounds though, as this makes your pet susceptible to Stoneclaw Totem and other taunt abilities like the growls of other hunters' pets! An aggressive pet may not do what you tell it to if something else catches its attention.
Fighting in confined spaces, for example defending a Tower or Bunker in a Battleground. Knowing that your pet will auto attack any intruder gives you one less thing to concentrate on when fighting in small areas. With Track Humanoids you should know when an enemy player is approaching, but any time saved in the heat of battle can be invaluable.

Defensive is useful when soloing but can also be dangerous, particularly when fighting against ranged enemies. With this setting your pet will attack anything that attacks you first. You should be careful about using this setting in a party as there are often situations where it is better to pick off a ranged attacker from range than to run to it and risk bringing more enemies. A pet chasing down ranged attackers can often draw many more enemies into a fight and quickly lead to the deaths of the whole party!

On non-PvP realms, if you are attacked, and your pet is on defensive, any actions your pet takes without your command do not result in PvP-flagging. It will result in the "area is under attack" messages that are automatically generated by the server, usually bringing members of the opposing faction running, but they will be unable to attack you. If you tell your pet to attack, even if you do not take action against the guards, it WILL flag you, but the defensive response of a pet in defensive mode will not.

Passive is a safe setting and probably wisest to use while grouping, especially in a dungeon setting. Your pet will not attack anything unless you instruct it to. Even if you or it are attacked it will not fight back. It might sound annoying to have to tell your pet to defend you but it means you have total control over where your pet is and can prevent it from initiating fights you don't want to get into.

Focus Dumps

Hunters which have the Bestial Discipline and/or Go For The Throat talents will find that their pet generates much more focus than it can use with Growl alone. It is highly recommended, therefore, to train the pet with extra abilities that can be used to turn that extra focus into more DPS. The best abilities for this purpose are those with low/no cooldown, and which can therefore be spammed by the pet. These abilities are often referred to as 'focus dumps', and include Claw, Gore, Scorpid Poison and Screech.

The main pets able to keep their focus low are cats, ravagers, boars, bears, windserpents, scorpids. This all depends on your crit chance however.