Old habits die hard

Things I still need to get used to, even though I'm now fairly comfortable with Focus:

1. Not automatically stopping to cast Multi-Shot (you can now cast it while moving)
2. Not wasting Focus on Widow Venom (that keybind used to be Aimed Shot, which used to do damage as well as the healing debuff, unlike WV)
3. Using Scatter Shot, particularly in BM spec
4. Using Lifeblood for the haste buff instead of saving it for the now-pathetic heal component

Anyone else?

Watch your login screen!

No, I'm not crazy... you really should spend an extra second watching the login screen - your character will do an appropriate animation for your class; in my case, shooting a bow:

Even though the login screen isn't really an important part of gameplay, it's still nice to find the little things that change in WoW :)

He's cute, really!

This is my new favourite tank pet.

Yes, my turtle Koopa is still the last line of defence for all things tankable, but seriously... for AoE, Burrow Attack is unbelieveably hax - my lvl 79 worm was taking a good half health off lvl 70 elites in heroic Sethekk Halls; I can't wait to try it on Garr when I next have time.

Plus, it does much more damage than Bad Attitude ever did for crocolisks, although a Thunderstomping slime is another of my favourites... so I won't be releasing Slimer any time soon, either!

(25 stable slots? Yeah, not enough. Really not enough!)

Take that!

Finally some retribution for Sylvanas:

Buying that item was worth the gold... I've been wanting to kill Arthas ever since my first introduction to the creation of a banshee in WC3!

Move To vs Eyes of the Beast

Pro: You can move your pet while still being in control of your character.
Con: Your pet doesn't "jump" ledges.

I discovered the latter point yesterday and wiped my heroic 5man group with it; luckily it was a guild run and not a PuG.

Sadly, this means we'll have to dismiss pets before jumping down in dungeons... I know it's only a 2sec cast time and your pet doesn't lose happiness anymore, but I still don't like doing it - waving goodbye to a pet never seems nice :(

Trap Launcher = Unimpressive

Initially, I was rather excited to start practicing throwing traps around with the new Trap Launcher.

Now that I've tried it, I'm disappointed.

It's awkward to use, because there's a small delay between casting Trap Launcher and being able to cast your chosen Trap (unlike the old Freezing Arrow, or just placing a trap at your feet, which is instant).

Even macroing both together doesn't work (as far as I know; I'm not an expert macro-er), since the delay is still there and you still have to spam the macro twice.

If you're trying to make every global cooldown count, the Trap Launcher mechanic definitely needs work... here's hoping it gets changed before competitive PvP starts.

Trueshot Time

With Patch 4.0.1 beginning the Cataclysmic change in WoW, it's finally time for me to take the plunge and do something I haven't done since Vanilla WoW - spec Marksman.

Survival used to be my favourite survival/utility spec from Vanilla - longer and better traps, extra CC spells - everything to make sure that you last as long as possible on the battlefield; a cannon not so glassy.

Well, all of that really can't compare to the new Chimera Shot. 5% self-healing? Are you kidding me? Not to mention - Scatter Shot is baseline and Readiness is an adequate replacement for Wyvern.

Right now, the only Survival talent left that really jumps out at me as OMGMUSTHAVE is a new one, Mirrored Blades, which is on a much longer cooldown than Silencing Shot... so while I'm pretty sure I'd have a whole lot more fun with that talent than possibly any other talent in any tree (oh, the mages I could kill with their own Pyroblasts...), it isn't enough to carry the Survival tree by itself.

Oh well - looking forward to learning MM. I guess I'll finally find out what it's like to be the top DPS spec in WotLK :)

On another note: I'm really happy to finally post a pure hunter blog post again. It's been so long since my last one that this blog was beginning to feel like a general blog instead of a hunter one!

AQ Scepter Quest Chain - Get it done!

One of the most (if not *the* most) epic quest chains in WoW, the AQ Scepter chain, will be scrapped in Cataclysm.

I highly recommend you do this chain if you haven't already; most of the steps will be fairly easy to get through with a small group of 80s (as opposed to the full raids of 60s they used to take).

There will probably be no Achievement or Feat of Strength for completing the chain, but being able to say you've done it is a reward in itself :)

Hexxer is Haxxor

I finally got motivated enough to completely solo clear ZG the other day, and I can tell you now - Jin'do is definitely the most difficult boss in there.

He drops more than a few Mind Control totems (as seen in the above pic!), which tends to make you kill your own personal tank, so here's the method that worked for me:

• Use a mix of PvP/raiding gear and BM spec (for better pet survivability).
• Use a Ferocity pet (I used my wolf, Fury).

1. Blow all cooldowns as soon as you start.
2. As soon as a shade spawns and reaches you, Mend Pet and Feign Death.
3. Stay Feigned while your pet solos Jin'do, using pet abilities (eg. Cower) on cooldown.
4. While Feigned, unequip your weapons.
5. When your pet gets low on health, blow Beastial Wrath and Mend Pet in quick succession - these spells will be all you get off before being Mind Controlled.
6. Since you unequipped your weapons, you will run around trying to punch your pet to death.
7. If your pet dies before Mind Control wears off, rez using Heart of the Phoenix and repeat from the beginning.
8. If you don't have Heart of the Phoenix, you can either try and kite/melee Jin'do for the last bit of health, or use Deterrence and try and rez your pet manually.

For my kill Fury managed to survive through Mind Control, so I didn't have to rez.

Definitely a lot more fun trying to kill this guy than your average tank n' gank fight, so I'm glad I did it before ZG disappears in Cataclysm!

Getting my Mojo back

I'd been getting a little bored lately - trying to PuG raids when there aren't any running (Oceanic-time players on Proudmoore are in a pre-expansion slump) and farming for mounts that are about as likely to drop as me changing mains (ie: not @#$%ing likely) was getting a little old.

Not to mention, I've about given up on getting any T10.5 - it's just not happening.

Happily, I found something to do last night that renewed my interest in spending time on my hunter instead of my druid again (I do like alts, really... especially my druid. I just don't like them all that much - if there's anything at all I can do on the hunter I'd much rather do that): Farming for Mojo.

What's so fun about farming trash, you may ask?

Well, anything that isn't easy (read: "has a chance of me dying") is a challenge. Just like healing heroic HoR with a 3.8k gearscore is a challenge (take that, you stupid tank that a) tried to kick my druid and b) left before the last boss, after we'd all survived the 1st 2 bosses with no deaths).

And I like challenges.

It wasn't too much of one - I only died twice (once on the Eagle gauntlet - which I finished with ease the next time round - and once on the trash in front of Lynx), but at least I've found a solo activity to have fun with again!

No, I didn't get Mojo.

However, I've found that it's probably faster just to reset the Eagle gauntlet than to wait for trash to respawn, so hopefully I'll get Mojo some time soon! :)